Discoveries
ANTIQUES & FINE ART, Summer 2011--
The Tower of Katoubia Mosque by Sir Winston Churchill. Given by Churchill to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, this is the only painting Churchill composed during World War II.
Considered "The Greatest Englishman of All Time," for his stoic political and military leadership during World War II, Sir Winston Churchill was also an accomplished painter. Although he did not take up painting until the age of 40, he completed 500 works in his lifetime. Very few have ever come on the market; The Tower of Katoubia Mosque is Churchill's only painting produced during the war.
Following the first of three promising Allied conferences held in Casablanca in 1943. Churchill convinced President Roosevelt, his friend and mentor, to travel with him to Marrakech to see the Katoubia Mosque at sunset and marvel what Churchill considered, "the most beautiful place in the world." After making the journey and then bidding his friend farewell on the tarmac, Churchill returned to the tower to paint the scene. He then sent the painting to Roosevelt, who "proudly hung [it] in his Hyde Park home." The painting, was passed to Roosevelt's son, then to the Hickman family, and finally acquired by Bill Rau.
