Nicol produced a series of works on the theme of the Holocaust. “I remember the shock when my mother told me about it when I was growing up.” he said. The idea for this magnificent drawing, recalled Nicol “was triggered by a photograph in a book on American railroads – the man was riding in a box car with the door slid open and a shaft of light shining on him. That image kicked off my imagination." This drawing comes from the extensive cycle of work relating to the Holocaust, a subject which has long occupied Nicol, a Kilmarnock-born artist who came to London for his art school training. In this moving and sombre scene men and women have entirely lost their identities, being shown only as stark shapes or emaciated and huddled silhouettes - dark against light or light against dark. They await their destiny in a gaunt and miserable interior, herded together but each lost in a separate world of suffering.

Brian Nicol, born 1941

Born in 1941 in the industrial town of Kilmarnock into a coal mining family, after early struggles, Nicol made his way to London and got himself to Byam Shaw art school. He went on to win a scholarship to the Royal Academy Schools, where he excelled as a draughtsman. He has always worked outside the gallery system exhibiting at Open Studios and through private dealers.