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| Mountains and Trees | North Norfolk |
1902 - 1967
Educated at the Royal Naval Colleges, Osbourne & Dartmouth and at Balliol College, Oxford. He joined the Diplomatic service in 1926 and travelled widely with his career. He was appointed 3rd Secretary to the Diplomatic Service (1926); 2nd Secretary (1931); 1st Secretary (1937); Acting Counsellor (1943); Charge D’Altaires – Athens (1945-47); Foreign Office (1947-48); Ambassador to Ethiopia (1949-51); Minister to Afghanistan (1953-57); Minister to Japan (1957-59). He was made KCMG in 1954 and CMG 1946.
In his time off from the diplomatic service, he would take a taxi and travel into the countryside to paint. Whilst in Ethiopia and Afghanistan he would go into the barren hills and terrain and capture the mood and light of the silent landscape.
The most talented linguist of his generation in the diplomatic service, he was once arrested as a spy, as he spoke the local language so fluently (in total he spoke over 24 languages). When he delivered his credentials to the Emperor of Abyssinia he made the speech in Amharic.
His paintings were original and remarkable, for although they were expressions of his eye, they were reflections of the styles and influences of many great artists of the period. In his later years he lived in Cley, North Norfolk and was a member of the Norfolk and Norwich Art Circle (1947-66) and a prolific painter of the local landscape.
His sister Susan Lascelles was also an artist and taught art at Runton Hill School.