Derek Hill, whose remarkable talent has been allowed to fade and still, sadly, remains, as Brian Sewell's insightful foreword suggests, 'a seriously underrated painter'. Born in 1916, educated at Marlborough, by the time the Hill was learning to be a theatre designer in Munich, he was already a widely-travelled, well-connected and sophisticated young man claiming Diana and Unity Mitford as good friends. He was in Russia at the start of the Stalin purges, helping to stage the final revolutionary theatrical events in Moscow and St Petersburg. And it would be in Paris in the 1930s when he at last decided to become a painter. His art is based on incredible technique, and though the list of all his high society patrons is impressive, his landscapes, especially of his beloved Donegal and Tory Island may well be his lasting testament. Bruce Arnold's text is full of the flavour of his subject; his humour, his warmth, his generosity - especially to younger artists -even his extraordinary appetite for rich, dangerous food.
It is a fine portrait of a fine artist and it is to be hoped that publication of this beautifully illustrated book will help gain Derek Hill the respect his oeuvre deserves.