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Versatile painter, draughtsman, designer and illustrator, born in Brentford, Middlesex, full name Robert Arthur Bartlett, son of Arthur Edward Bartlett, an architect who exhibited at RA before World War I, and Ella Carlin. Robin was educated at Shrewsbury School, entered the Royal Navy as a cadet and was a midshipman from 1918 until late 1919, acting as a French interpreter. After graduating in history from Oxford University, 1921, worked in Paris, attending life classes in the evenings, then studied at the Slade School of Fine Art from 1922 under Henry Tonks (who in 1928 gave him a glowing reference), also history of art. Bartlett won several prizes, including a first for figure drawing and an Orpen Bursary, and did a little teaching. While at the Slade Bartlett began an affair with Eileen Agar, whom he married in 1925, but they divorced in 1929.

Text source: 'Artists in Britain Since 1945' by David Buckman (Art Dictionaries Ltd, part of Sansom & Company)


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