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Erno Goldfinger

1 of 4 portraits of Erno Goldfinger

© estate of Eileen Agar

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Erno Goldfinger

by Eileen Agar
pen and ink, 1938
20 5/8 in. x 15 1/2 in. (524 mm x 394 mm)
Purchased, 1990
Primary Collection
NPG 6099

On display in Room 27 on Floor 2 at the National Portrait Gallery

Sitterback to top

Artistback to top

  • Eileen Agar (1899-1991), Painter. Artist or producer of 2 portraits, Sitter in 6 portraits.

This portraitback to top

An advocate of high-rise housing and of the tower block, his classicism has been emphasized by the Surrealist Eileen Agar who portrays him flaked by images of the Pantheon in Rome.

Linked publicationsback to top

  • Rogers, Malcolm, Master Drawings from the National Portrait Gallery, 1993 (accompanying the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from 5 August to 23 October 1994), p. 179
  • Saywell, David; Simon, Jacob, Complete Illustrated Catalogue, 2004, p. 251

Events of 1938back to top

Current affairs

Britain pursues its policy of appeasement. At the Munich Agreement, Britain, France and Italy agreed to allow Hitler to seize the Sudetenland area of Czechoslovakia. The agreement was seen at the time as a triumph for peace, with Neville Chamberlain returning home brandishing the paper agreement and saying 'peace for our time.' Within six months Germany had occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia.

Art and science

Graham Greene publishes Brighton Rock. The novel follows the descent of Pinky, a teenage gang leader in Brighton's criminal underworld. The book examines the criminal mind and explores the themes of morality and sin - recurrent concerns for the Roman Catholic Author.
Glasgow hosts the Empire Exhibition; an £11 million celebration of the British Empire visited by 13 million people.

International

In its pursuit of 'Lebensraum' (living space), Germany annexes Austria and parts of Czechoslovakia with little opposition from the League of Nations. At home, the Nazis continued their escalating persecution of the Jews with 'Kristallnacht' (the Night of Broken Glass), attacking Jewish homes, shops, businesses and synagogues, and taking Jewish men to concentration camps.

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