Description
Oil on board portrait of a boy by P.M. Hill. Circa 1943, signed ‘P M Hill’ on the bottom left of the painting.
The reverse features two rough sketches of a nude woman and writing which reads ‘RBA 1943 Boy’.
P.M. HILL
P.M. HILL
Period: Circa 1943
Price: sold
Oil on board portrait of a boy by P.M. Hill. Circa 1943, signed ‘P M Hill’ on the bottom left of the painting.
The reverse features two rough sketches of a nude woman and writing which reads ‘RBA 1943 Boy’.
P.M. HILL
sold
Frame measurements – Height 50cm x Width 40cm x Depth 4cm.
Painting measurements – Height 39cm x Width 29cm.
Philip M Hill was the son of a Judge, he was educated at King’s College School and read history at Balliol College, Oxford. He began training as an architect, but this was interrupted by the Great War, after which he trained as a solicitor, qualifying in 1923. He was immediately appointed Assistant Manager of the UK Chamber of Shipping, becoming Deputy in 1938 and General Manager from 1941 until 1950. From 1933 he began painting, studying art in both London and St Ives, and exhibited at a number of leading art societies.
He was a member of the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA), a British art body established in 1823 as the Society of British Artists, as an alternative to the Royal Academy.
He also designed a poster of Polperro for the Great Western Railway Company. A devout Catholic, he and his wife, Megan Rhys, painted the panels of Christ and the Twelve Apostles and the four Doctors of the Church which used to hang on the front of the organ loft at St Ives RC Church. In the 1950s he exhibited at St Ives Show Days from the Piazza Studios. When he died he had just completed a new translation of the Greek poet Sappho being printed by Guido Morris; he passed away the night before the advance copy was delivered.
