Demure Allen Jones

Coming up in Bonhams Post-War & Contemporary sale on 1 July in London is this demure Portrait of Barbara (1957) by Allen Jones, his former girlfriend when they studied at Hornsey College of Art. Jones submitted the painting as part of his application to the Royal College of Art. It still has a sticker on its back to identify it as Jones’s "Testimony of Study" number 1 of 28. The college tried to persuade him that figurative art was dead; but Jones stuck with it, producing the sexist and female-demeaning furniture for which he has become infamous. Barbara put her portrait in the sale, estimated at £25,000 - £35,000 (CLICK).