Whitechapel Station

This is a preparatory drawing for Larkins' 1921 etching, 'Whitechapel Station'. Here passengers, including a respectable well-dressed couple, wait on the platform for the arrival of an underground train. Promoted as being safe for middle class and female passengers the underground system crossed the social divide by bringing commuters from all classes together.

The artist, William Larkins was born in Bow, into a family of steeplejacks. He became an artist thanks to a scholarship that enabled him to spend five years at Goldsmiths College of Art. At Goldsmiths, Larkins was part of an outstanding generation of artists, including Graham Sutherland, who knew him well. Sutherland thought Larkins an 'inspired etcher ... he managed to combine a highly complex technique with an air of simplicity'.