A portrait of the writer DH Lawrence, which is thought to be the last one painted while he was alive, has been bought by Nottingham Museums.
Lawrence, who was born in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire, was most famous for his controversial novel Lady Chatterley’s Lover.
The portrait was bought from a private collector in the US with funding from several organisations.
It has been put on display in Newstead Abbey’s Historic House.
Lawrence has been considered one of the most significant authors of 20th century literature.
The portrait was painted by the Dutch artist Joep Nicolas in 1929. He was the brother-in-law of novelist Aldous Huxley, who was a friend of Lawrence.
In 1929, while travelling from Spain to Germany, Lawrence stayed at Huxley’s home in Suresnes, France. Nicolas was also staying and took the opportunity to paint Lawrence’s portrait.
Lawrence died the following year after earlier diagnoses of tuberculosis and malaria.
D H Lawrence was born on the 11th of September 1885 and died on the 2nd of March 1930. He is the son of a coal-miner. From these humble origins he became one of the foremost English novelists of his generation. His work is notable for its celebration of the body, but there is also a strong spiritual element to his outlook. Above all he rejected the obsession with material progress of modern western civilisation. He became notorious for his banned novel Lady Chatterley’s Lover, written a few years before his death in 1930, but his greatest works are the novels written just prior to and during the First World War: Sons and Lover, The Rainbow and Women in Love. He was also an outstanding poet, dramatist and essayist.
