Oil paint on canvas
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/william-roberts-1855" aria-label="More by William Roberts" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">William Roberts</a>
SelfPortrait Wearing a Cap
Purchased 1942
adults
artist, painter
arts and entertainment
body
clothing and personal items
hat, cap
head / face
man
named individuals
objects
people
portraits
Roberts, William
self-portraits
tie
work and occupations
<p>Roberts developed a highly personal style of portraiture. His earliest surviving drawings are predominantly portraits, and include a self-portrait of about 1911. Roberts preferred to employ familiar models and regularly used himself, his wife Sarah and his only son, John. The format increasingly favoured by the artist was head and shoulders. This allowed him to concentrate on the face and exclude any surrounding details which might be distracting. In 'Self Portrait Wearing a Cap' Roberts depicts himself in a shirt, wearing braces, tie and a flat cap. He thus identified himself as a working man, a persona he projected in later self-portraits of the 1950s and 1960s.</p><p><em>Gallery label, August 2004</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
20 January 2007 – 18 March 2007
2007-03-18
20 January 2007 – 18 March 2007
2007-03-18
2007-01-20
Pallant House Gallery (Chichester, UK)
2007-01-20
England at Play: The Cubist Life of William Roberts
Loan-out
27 April 2025 – 10 August 2025
2025-08-10
27 April 2025 – 10 August 2025
2025-08-10
2025-04-27
Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz, Museum Gunzenhauser (Chemnitz, Germany)
2025-04-27
European Realities
Loan-out
Self-Portrait Wearing a Cap
support: 559 × 359 mm
frame: 695 × 503 × 75 mm
Purchased 1942
<p>Roberts developed a highly personal style of <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/portrait" title="Glossary definition for 'Portrait'"><span>portraiture</span></a>. His earliest surviving <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/drawing" title="Glossary definition for 'Drawing'"><span>drawings</span></a> are predominantly portraits, and include a self-portrait of about 1911. Roberts preferred to employ familiar models and regularly used himself, his wife Sarah and his only son, John. The format increasingly favoured by the artist was head and shoulders. This allowed him to concentrate on the face and exclude any surrounding details which might be distracting. In 'Self Portrait Wearing a Cap' Roberts depicts himself in a shirt, wearing braces, tie and a flat cap. He thus identified himself as a working man, a persona he projected in later self-portraits of the 1950s and 1960s.</p>
Display caption
2004-08-31T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><b>N05372</b> SELF-PORTRAIT <i>c.</i> 1928</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Inscr. ‘Roberts.’ t.l.
<br/>Canvas, 22×14 1/8 (56×36).
<br/>Purchased from the Redfern Gallery (Knapping Fund) 1942.
<br/><i>Coll:</i> Sir Cyril Kendall Butler until 1942.
<br/><i>Exh:</i> London Artists' Association, Cooling Galleries, October–November 1931 (7), as ‘Portrait of the Artist wearing a Cap’; Redfern Gallery, July–August 1942 (33).
<br/><i>Repr:</i> William Roberts, <i>Paintings 1917–1958</i>, 1960, p.35, as painted 1928.</p>
<p></p>
<p>[no further details]
<br/>
<br/><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, <i>The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture</i>, London 1964, II
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-07-21T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
adults artist, painter arts and entertainment body clothing and personal items hat, cap head / face man named individuals objects people portraits Roberts, William self-portraits tie work and occupations