The Fitzwilliam Museum - University of Cambridge

Prunella Clough
(1919–1999)
Untitled
c. 1975
Oil on canvas, 132 x 122 cm.
PD.26–2003
Bequeathed by Bryan Charles
Francis Robertson
Painted around 1975, Prunella Clough's
Untitled, is one of a group of eighteen
paintings, drawings, prints, textiles and
sculpture bequeathed in 2003 by the
distinguished curator and critic,
Bryan Robertson. Robertson came to
Cambridge in 1949 to run the Heffer
Gallery, where he organised the city's first
exhibition of modern French painting. In
1952, he became Director of the
Whitechapel Art Gallery in London, where
he rapidly acquired an international
reputation for the ground-breaking
exhibitions he organised. Among these, in
1960, was the first retrospective of
Prunella Clough's work, an exhibition that
was of central importance in her career.
After leaving the Whitechapel in 1968,
Robertson worked as an arts administrator
in the United States and on his return to
the UK set up another innovative venture
in London, the Warwick Arts Trust. In
1999, the Kettle's Yard Gallery mounted
an exhibition '45-99: a personal view of
British painting by Bryan Robertson to
co-incide with which the Fitzwilliam
Museum invited him to make a 'Critic's
Choice' of works from the permanent
collection. He did so to celebrate his 'first
love' for French art of all periods.
Robertson's bequest to the Museum
included works by John Hubbard, John
Hoyland, Phillip King, Gary Wragg,
Jack Smith, Deanna Petherbridge,
Fantin-Latour, and an embroidered
Chinese 'Tribute Cloth'.
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Major Acquisitions