a half years later, intestate. John had set up the family house, 14 St Mark's Crescent, as a "house museum" with a changing selection of his father's paintings on show to friends. It was estimated that there were almost 475 paintings and drawings in the house at the time of his death, and the Tate Gallery agreed to store them for safe keeping. The fate of these works was of concern when The Guardian in 2004 revealed that the Treasury Solicitor, who had control of John's estate, refused to lend to the major Roberts retrospective, curated by Andrew Heard, at the Hatton Gallery in Newcastle upon Tyne and the Graves Art Gallery in Sheffield. Since then the collection has been saved, with 117 of these works having been allocated to the Tate in lieu of inheritance tax, and the Tate continuing to house the remainder until the period when claims may be made on the estate has expired, when they too will enter the Tate collection. A number of the drawings allocated to the Tate went on display at Tate Britain in 2012–13. In 2004 William Roberts: An English Cubist by Andrew Gibbon Williams, the standard monograph on this painter, was published. Between 1998 and 2015 the William Roberts Society furthered the appreciation and promotion of Roberts's work, being established as a registered charity in 2002 and publishing regular newsletters and occasional pamphlets. English Heritage unveiled a blue plaque at 14 St Mark's Crescent in 2003. A short film William Roberts: An Artist's House is accessible on YouTube. In 2007 Pallant House Gallery staged an exhibition William Roberts: England at Play, curated by Simon Martin. The sale of the Evill/Frost collection at Sotheby's in London in 2011 saw unprecedentedly high prices for Roberts's work, and in the following year The Chess Players (1929–30) was sold for over £1 million, also at Sotheby's. References Further reading Ben Uri Gallery and Museum (2003) The Tortoise and the Hare - Jacob Kramer & William Roberts External links Works by Roberts in the Tate collection Works by Roberts in the Imperial War Museum An English Cubist: William Roberts, 1895–1980, including a catalogue raisonné, texts of Roberts's writings, a bibliography, and reproductions of his works The Vorticists at the Restaurant de la Tour Eiffel, Spring 1915 1895 births 1980 deaths 20th-century English painters 20th-century English male artists Alumni of Saint Martin's School of Art Artists