Being....Lawrence Hendra Art UK takes a look at a day in the life of our Director and Head of Research

What's your role?

'I am a Director and the Head of Research at Philip Mould & Company in London. We specialise in British portraiture from 1550 to 1950 and have been in business for over 35 years.

My job is to source paintings for the gallery which often involves scouring online auction catalogues in the hope of finding hidden gems. If I spot something which may be of interest, we then request high-resolution images from the auction house and then get to work researching it. If it is a portrait - which it nearly always is - I try to establish the identity of the artist and sitter and establish any provenance. You never know how long this will take or where it will lead you until you get going and sometimes weeks can be spent researching a single work. On other occasions, however, you can find what you want quite quickly.

If the outcome of the research is positive and if we are happy with the images sent by the auction house, we will then bid and hopefully secure the work (we normally only get about a quarter of the works we go for, though!). Philip and I will then I oversee the cleaning, restoration and framing of the work and we will then offer it to clients...'

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