Lure Neutral Brook painted his first wife

Brook painted his first wife Peggy many times but this coy little portrait is so intimate a study

America has proved a rich vein for sourcing paintings in the last decade but unusually this American oil turned up in a London saleroom

She’s got noodles but they’re in the Golden Bowl - as in the Henry James novel - a fractured thing - she might end up scalding herself

sitting demurely in a beautiful silk gown it must surely be a coming out or at least a coming-of-age portrait

I absolutely adore them but they are rare and I expect one day soon a cleverer and richer dealer will root out a stash on the continent and make them very expensive overnight

Lure Neutral Brook painted his first wifeThis painting is in our Cecil Court gallery.