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Notes

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This portrait is one of three associated works depicting émigrée Sonia Husid, known by her nom-de-plume N. M. Seedo. Possibly a distant relative of Kossoff’s, she was an important model for the artist in this period. Seedo refers to their friendship in her semi-autobiographical account, 'In the Beginning was Fear' (1964). In this empathic portrait, Kossoff clearly conveys her strength through suffering. Born in Bessarabia and educated in Vienna, she was a member of a socialist Zionist group before she settled in England in 1930 and became known as a Yiddishist. This drawing bears a striking resemblance to 'Seated Woman', a 1957 oil painting, and a charcoal and conté drawing of the same title exhibited in Kossoff’s second and third London Group exhibitions.