George Lambert Cross Stitch Kits & Patterns (2)
George Lambert (1873–1930) was the Australian artist who proved that colonial ambition and genuine artistic genius were not mutually exclusive — and did it with a swagger and self-assurance that made him one of the most compelling figures in the history of Australian art. Born in St Petersburg to an American father and brought to Australia as a child, Lambert grew up in New South Wales, won the first New South Wales Travelling Art Scholarship in 1900, and promptly left for London and Paris, where he spent the next two decades becoming exactly the kind of cosmopolitan, technically brilliant, socially magnetic artist that colonial Australia simultaneously produced and then struggled to hold on to.
In London he became a celebrated portrait painter and sculptor, moving in the highest social and artistic circles with the ease of a man who had decided early that he belonged there and saw no reason to revise that opinion. His portraits have a psychological acuity and technical brilliance that place him among the finest portraitists working in Britain in the early 20th century — sharp, confident, and painted with a bravura brushwork that makes them look almost effortlessly good, which of course means they were extraordinarily difficult to achieve.
During the First World War, Lambert served as Australia's official war artist, travelling to Gallipoli and the Middle East and producing some of the most powerful and historically significant war art in Australian history — including his monumental painting Anzac, the Landing 1915, which remains one of the defining images of Australian national memory. He returned to Australia in 1921 to a reception that was both celebratory and slightly bewildered — the country wasn't entirely sure what to do with an artist of his stature and international experience, which is a story Australian art has told more than once. In counted cross stitch, Lambert's bold, confident compositions and rich, varied palette translate into designs of real visual authority and character. Browse our George Lambert cross stitch kit collection and choose a premium Lambert cross stitch kit or download a George Lambert cross stitch pattern instantly.
