AN oil painting by Worcester's great artist Benjamin Williams Leader will be seen in public for the first time in 140 years.

The picture of Claines churchyard is expected to fetch up to £50,000 when it is auctioned at Christie's next month.

Painted in 1863, it features a young woman, possibly a widow and her child tending a grave - possibly her late husband's - at St John The Baptist church.

It was exhibited the following year at the Royal Academy in London. At the time it was bought for £100 by a London dealer, before being sold to a family, who have had the work in their possession since.

A spokesman for Christie's said the work has not been seen on public display since 1864.

"It is representative of Leader's early period when he was developing his distinctive and independent style," he said.

"It is a style that has made him one of the most popular landscape artists of his time."

Other works at the auction on Friday, June 11, include Leader's 1870s painting of Stokesay Castle near Ludlow, in Shropshire, which was the home of Worcester MP John Derby Allcroft. The picture cost £18 new and is now expected to fetch up to £8,000.

Leader was born in Worcester on March 12, 1831, above the family's ironmongers in High Street, now part of Cathedral Plaza.

He was the third of 11 children, educated at the city's Royal Grammar School and was the first Worcester artist to be elected to the prestigious Royal Academy.

Fans

Famous fans include King George V and Prime Minister William Gladstone, who both owned his work.

If the Claines picture reaches its pre-sale estimate, it will be the fifth most expensive Leader work sold. The record price paid was for his 1888 work, entitled A Summer's day - When the south wind congregates in crowds. The floating mountains of the silver clouds.

It sold for £168,000 at Sotheby's in London, last year.