LAURA KNIGHT, R.A., R.W.S. (BRITISH, 1877-1970), HAROLD KNIGHT, R.A. (BRITISH, 1874-1961), SAMUEL JOHN LAMORNA BIRCH, R.A. (BRITISH, 1869-1955) AND WILLIAM KNIGHT (1840-1923)

This extraordinary small album was put together by Harold Knight's niece, Mary Eady, daughter of his sister, Agnes. This was her 'autograph book' between the ages of 13 and 15, and must have been filled in on her holidays to Lamorna. Many of the small notes are from her three brothers, Bob, Ben and Harry, but the drawings contained within the album are a remarkable snapshot of the creativity of Lamorna. Humorous sketches of illness by Laura Knight sit alongside a drawing of 'A distinguished but disagreeable gentleman' by Harold Knight, a charming watercolour landscape by Lamorna Birch, and a sharp and tightly drawn 'recollection of Staithes' by William Knight, Harold's architect father, drawn two years before his death.
In 1933 Mary Eady married Sir David Taylor Monteath, Permanent Under Secretary of State for India and Burma, and Harold Knight painted her portrait as a wedding present. The bench dedicated to her in Oxford Botanic Gardens was immortalised in Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials as the meeting place between worlds.