This a palette knife portrait of Katie White who was a very close friend of my mothers as they both attended Bournemouth College at the same time in the ’40s. It is a good representation of the classic palette knife portraits she was doing when she first returned to Bournemouth after her travels in the Far East and Africa. The striking background of a stormy sky over rolling hills was a token acknowledgement of the Celtic origins of the subject’s family but I think it lends a very cold air to the painting as a whole.
This painting makes a good example to compare with a later portrait she did utilizing her scrub technique.