Although he trained as an actor, Rolf Brandt enjoyed drawing and making collages. In his native Germany he developed an interest in Dada and Surrealism and in Bauhaus artists such as Paul Klee. He moved to London from Hamburg in the early 1930s with his brother Bill (1904–83), who became famous as a photographer. His drawings for illustration were first published in the 1940s and he became known for his haunting, Surrealistic style and delicate line.
This drawing for a short story by Charles Dickens was one of a number made for an anthology of weird, romantic, if sometimes horrific stories published under the title Come Not Lucifer in 1945. The peculiar qualities of this image are highly individual while at the same time reflecting the horrors that had been part of many people’s lives during the Second World War.
