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We are grateful to Richard Shone for his kind assistance when writing this catalogue note.

This mystical scene depicts a mermaid and swimmer, their contorted poses alluding to Grant’s famous 1911 painting Bathers, purchased by the Tate in 1931 (N04567). The male figure in this work is thought to be based on Paul Roche, a close friend and a lifelong companion of Grant who often posed for portraits and nude studies.

Roche was one of Grant’s closest friends and was arguably one of his most important male muses in the latter half of his life. The pair first met in 1946 outside Piccadilly Circus tube station and remained close friends for the next thirty-two years until Grant’s death in 1978. Roche, who was thirty at the time, started modelling for Grant the day after they met and he later recalled how ‘Though it was the summer, two things I realised as a model: you soon get tired of even the very easy pose… [and] it seems warm but you begin to feel cold.[1]

In 1954 Roche married and moved to America and he took up a teaching position at Smith College, Massachusetts. He remained a devoted friend to Grant and in 1961 when Vanessa Bell died, he returned to England with his family to take care of his ageing friend. Grant died in 1978 and five years later, following his divorce, Roche moved to Mallorca where he lived for the rest of his life until his death in 2007. This work was given by Grant himself to Roche, who kept it in his collection until 1983.

Although Roche would likely not have posed directly for this painting, the slim and fair figure certainly appears to be heavily inspired by Roche, conjured from Grant’s imagination.

The Bloomsbury group held progressively liberal ideas about sex and relationships and their free-thinking bohemia nurtured an atmosphere of acceptance and celebration toward sexual liberation and gender fluidity. Grant had relationships with a few male members, and these complex relationships and affairs infuse much of his work, arguably including the present work. At Charleston, seductive nudes and erotic imagery fill canvas’s, panels and ceramics. Some of this imagery alludes to mythological subjects, much like the present work.

[1] Roche, P., quoted in, Davis, P. E. H. (2011) ‘Painter’s Model and Poet: Paul Roche’, Charleston. [online]. Available at: https://www.charleston.org.uk/... (Accessed: 10/10/2020).