Harold Waite

Harold Waite kept a studio above a pie shop in 1830s Dublin, where the smell of custard tarts drifted up through the floorboards. He painted politicians and writers as if they’d just stepped out of the pub, no stiff poses, just honest faces lit by the same soft light that spilled across the cobblestones outside. Look for his Portrait of Justin McCarthy in the bundle; it’s the one where the politician’s whiskers seem to twitch like he’s about to tell a joke.