A half-length, full-face portrait, showing Binney in his commander’s undress Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve uniform. He is holding a pipe to his mouth with his left hand and dividers in his right. He is sitting at a desk with a chart of the Skagerrak before him. The painting is signed and dated: ‘Rupert Shephard, 1945’.
(Frederick) George Binney was an explorer and blockade runner. While at Merton College, a chance meeting with Julian Huxley led Binney to become the organizer and secretary of the Oxford University Spitsbergen mission of 1921. He led the Merton College Arctic expedition in 1923 and a further University expedition in 1924. He was the first to use a seaplane for Arctic surveys; his achievements earned him the Royal Geographical Society’s Back award. He wrote of his experiences in ‘With seaplane and sledge in the Arctic’, published in 1925.
Binney joined the Hudson’s Bay Company in 1926, writing ‘The Eskimo book of knowledge’ (1931), which was the first book other than the Bible in the Inuit language. He later joined the United Steel Companies Ltd, eventually becoming its globe-trotting export director. In December 1939, he was sent by the Ministry of Supply to Sweden to negotiate the purchase of equipment, specialist steel and ball-bearings, which were vital for the British armaments industry. Cut off by the German invasion of Denmark and Norway in April 1940, he determined to run the Skagerrak blockade. Known as Operation Rubble, Binney, acting as commodore, sailed from Bro Fjord north of Göteborg on 23 January 1941; he reached Kirkwall with 25,000 tons of supplies and five ships. Operation Performance in March 1942 was less successful: eight of the ten ships were sunk or scuttled.
As a commander in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, he saw further active service in the war; despite being invalided out after a heart attack, he was also involved in Operation Moonshine, delivering supplies to the Danish resistance. He was knighted in 1941 and appointed to the DSO in 1944. He returned to United Steel after the war.
Rupert Shephard studied at the Slade School of Art from 1926 until 1929. On leaving the Slade, he became a schoolmaster, using his evenings to paint; he exhibited works at number of London venues. During the Second World War he worked as an official war artist. Shephard then moved to South Africa to become the director of the Michaelis Art School at the University of Cape Town. He returned to Britain in 1962 and was able to paint full-time.