British and World Coins, Numismatic Books

Elizabeth II (1952-, England, Elizabeth II, the positive model for the obv. for a coin or medal by T.H. Paget, crowned bust right, queen elizabeth the second around, 225mm. Extremely fine and as made, UNIQUE (£150-200)

Provenance:
T.H. Paget Collection, Sotheby Auction, 15-16 November 1984, lot 733 (part).

Plate 2. Following the accession of Elizabeth II, the Royal Mint Advisory Committee invited designs for a portrait of the new Queen from artists both experienced in coin and medal work and from a small number of other sculptors. Seventeen artists were supplied with profile photographs of the Queen as a basis for relief plaster models of an uncrowned and a crowned portrait. The plasters were given anonymous identification marks and in the late summer of 1952 the committee eventually selected the uncrowned effigy by Mrs Mary Gillick and the crowned effigy by Cecil Thomas. The works of Paget and his sculptress wife Winifred, née Turner, did not make the final cut although the Queen is believed to have liked Paget’s crowned effigy (Dyer, NC 1980, p.173)