Edward Seago, R.W.S., R.B.A. (1910-1974)

Seago made his only visit to Hong Kong in 1962, at the invitation of John Kidston Swire, Seago's patron and Chairman of the parent company of the Far Eastern Trading and Shipping Group, whose Hong Kong manager wanted six pictures for a new boardroom. The company paid Seago's expenses and he refunded them in paintings. While appalled at the poverty that he sometimes met there, Seago found Hong Kong to be a very rich source of inspiration and the trip resulted in eighty paintings and watercolours. The artist was fascinated by the furtive alleys and bustling streets where shafts of sunlight contrasted with deep shadows. (see J. Reid, Edward Seago The Landscape Art, London, 1991, p. 230).
Hong Kong was once in the collection of Richard Buckle, C.B.E., a renowned ballet critic of Diaghilev's time, founder of the magazine Ballet, and critic for The Observer and The Sunday Times. He also helped revolutionise ideas about mounting exhibitions, and notably organised the successful exhibition of Cecil Beaton's photographs at the National Portrait Gallery in 1968. Buckle also oversaw the Epstein Memorial Exhibition for the Edinburgh Festival of 1961 and wrote extensively on the artist, contributing to Epstein's Autobiography (1963) and penning Jacob Epstein: Sculptor, of the same year.