Pen and ink, watercolour and white highlights on brown paper

12 x 18 (30.5 x 45.8 cm)

Alan Sorrell made a considerable reputation for his remarkable ‘reconstruction’ drawings of ancient sites. His formative time in Rome, as the 1928 Rome Scholar in Decorative Painting,  had a crucial influence on the direction of his later work. Typically Sorrell made sketches and preparatory drawings of his subjects on the spot and then worked them up later into imaginative compositions.These  drawings and paintings combine his keen interest in history, and collaboration with archaeological and historical experts, His reconstruction drawings  brought him into close working relationships with many of the foremost archaeologists of his day, including Sir Cyril and Aileen Fox, Sir Mortimer Wheeler, Leonard Woolley, Kathleen Kenyon, Ian Richmond, Richard Atkinson, Stuart Piggott, V E Nash-Williams, Stuart Rigold and many others.