Original Etching 'Elegant Lady' by Nigel Lambourne (1919-1988) Inscribed 'to Toby' Signed & Dated 69

Fine quality etching of an elegant lady in a tight fitting dress. It is inscribed 'To Toby' the artist Toby Horne Shepherd. They were friends and often swapped their paintings. Nigel Lambourne was born in Croydon in 1919 and studied at the Central School of arts and crafts followed by the Royal College of art 1937-39 where his tutors included Robert Austin and Malcolm Osbourne. After the war he completed his degree at the Rca, becoming a college lecturer at Guildford and finally Leicester. In the late 1940’s he established himself as a book illustrator working for the Folio Society. He held his first one man show of drawings at the Colnaghi’s in 1947 and in 1949, a show at the Kensington Gallery. He held many one man shows in the 1950’s including Zwemmer’s and Wilton Galleries. In 1950/51 he undertook work on the Festival of Britain at the South Bank exhibition center. The Tate, Art’s Council, National Galleries of Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the Museum of Modern Art in New York all hold examples of his work. He died in 1988.