A late Roman marble mosaic of a lion, circa 4th-5th...

A late Roman marble mosaic of a lion, circa 4th-5th century AD, the multi-coloured composition on a white ground, preserving a lioness and her cub, the mother facing left, her head turned out to her right, with wide eyes intensely gazing outward, her tail extended, with a cub leaping and gazing upward at its mother with its mouth open, leaves and pink flowers in the field, 100 x 125cm

Provenance: Private collection of Victor Aubrey Lownes (April 17, 1928 – January 11, 2017). Lownes was an executive for HMH Publishing Company Inc., later known as Playboy Enterprises, from 1955 through the early 1980s.

Behind the image of a high-flying suave sophisticated, non-stop, executive, Lownes was a relaxed man who enjoyed everything English. He was the iconic Playboy— skiing in Europe and Aspen —swimming in his jacuzzi with the inevitable bevy of beauties—flying a helicopter to the races— enjoying riding to the hounds and country sports from his home Stocks House in Hertfordshire and although a patriotic American through and through Victor was his happiest here in England . He had a keen eye for art and furnished every property he had with interesting paintings. Incredibly erudite, Lownes knew what he liked, proved by some of the paintings he invested in over the years, artists as diverse as Francis Bacon and Egon Schiele intermingling with more traditional artists such as Gainsborough and Constable.