1918 - Doctor and Patient

Doctor and Patient 1918

Pencil

20 x 20 cm

Signed 'L.S. Lowry' (lower right) and Dated '1918' (lower left)

Provenance

The property of Mr Joseph Fitton; Sotheby's, 10 June 1998, lot 11 (£4,830)

with The Halcyon Gallery, London, where purchased by a previous owner

In Doctor and Patient, Lowry gives us a rare glimpse behind his preferred subject of the street scene, into the private interior of a bedroom where a doctor is visiting his patient. Lowry's interior scenes are scarce, but those he did depict were as familiar territory as the streets he pounded on his daily rounds as a rent collector and the subject of a doctor visiting his patient would have been one that he was thoroughly conversant with. Since his childhood Lowry's mother had been ill. Without specifics as to what she was ill with, Elizabeth Lowry was always known to be of a fragile disposition, her health deteriorating with the family's downturn of fortune. Despite living to the grand age of 82, she spent much of Lowry's childhood resting and being taken care of by Lowry, his father and their housemaid. Lowry lived with his mother until the day she died, including the last eight years of her life whilst she was bedridden. The visit from the local doctor would have been a sight that he would have seen many times throughout his lifetime.