Winter Catalogue 2013-2014

Page 1

ONE HUNDRED DRAWINGS & WATERCOLOURS STEPHEN ONGPIN GUY PEPPIATT

Riverwide House 6 Mason’s Yard Duke Street, St James’s London SW1Y 6BU

2013-2014

Stephen Ongpin Fine Art Guy Peppiatt Fine Art Ltd.

ONE HUNDRED DRAWINGS AND WATERCOLOURS



GUY PEPPIATT FINE ART STEPHEN ONGPIN FINE ART

ONE HUNDRED DRAWINGS AND WATERCOLOURS dating from the 16th century to the present day

WINTER CATALOGUE 2013–2014

to be exhibited at Riverwide House 6 Mason’s Yard Duke Street, St. James’s London SW1Y 6BU

Stephen Ongpin Fine Art Tel.+44 (0) 20 7930 8813 or + 44 (0)7710 328 627 info@stephenongpinfineart.com www.stephenongpin.com

Guy Peppiatt Fine Art Tel.+44 (0) 20 7930 3839 or +44 (0)7956 968 284 guy@peppiattfineart.co.uk www.peppiattfineart.co.uk 1


We are delighted to present our sixth annual Winter catalogue of One Hundred Drawings and Watercolours, which will, as usual, be accompanied by a Christmas exhibition in our London gallery. The areas of Old Master drawings, early British watercolours, and 19th and 20th century drawings, have long been regarded as disparate fields, each with their own enthusiasts and collectors, auctions and exhibitions. Part of the purpose of this catalogue, and indeed part of the aim of our shared gallery, is to blur the distinction between these collecting areas. A glance at the works included in this catalogue will, we hope, show that a fine drawing or watercolour is always worthy of attention, whoever the artist and whatever the date. This catalogue includes a wide range of British and European drawings, watercolours and oil sketches, placed more or less in chronological order, ranging in date from the late 16th century to the present day. As a glance at the enclosed price list will show, the prices of the drawings are equally broad in scope – from under £500 to around £15,000 – with a large number of interesting works at the lower end of this range. The catalogue aims to show that drawings and watercolours by wellestablished artists can be very affordable, and interesting works by minor or lesser-known artists especially so. There is, we believe, much in this catalogue for the novice collector, as well as for the more experienced connoisseur or museum curator. Our respective individual catalogues of more significant drawings will be issued in January and May 2014. In the meantime, we are delighted to present this Winter catalogue of more moderately priced works. We hope you find something in it to interest you, and look forward to greeting you at the gallery over the coming months. Guy Peppiatt Stephen Ongpin Lavinia Harrington

The following catalogue contains a combination of drawings and watercolours from the stock of Stephen Ongpin Fine Art (SOFA) and Guy Peppiatt Fine Art (GPFA). Those of the former are marked SOFA and the latter GPFA in red at the top of each page; please therefore direct any enquiries as appropriate. Only a brief account of each drawing is given in the catalogue. Further information and references, as well as high-resolution digital images of each of the works, are available on request. The drawings are available for viewing from receipt of the catalogue. Most of the works are sold framed. A price list is included. 2


SOFA

1 FERRAÙ FENZONI Faenza 1562-1645 Faenza

Among the most interesting and distinctive Italian artists active in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, Ferraù Fenzoni arrived in Rome as a young man, working at the Vatican and painting frescoes for several Roman churches. Between 1593 and 1599 he worked in the Umbrian hill town of Todi before returning to his native Faenza. The present sheet may be added to a small and stylistically homogenous group of figure drawings by Fenzoni, drawn in either black or red chalk, which are today in the Uffizi, the Albertina, the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan and elsewhere. Each of these drawings is characterized by a robust handling of stumped chalk, abbreviated contours and a particularly expressive treatment of hands, and may be dated to the early part of Fenzoni’s long career, before his move from Rome to Umbria in 1593.

A Young Man Standing in Profile to the Right Black chalk, with stumping 394 x 183 mm., 15 ½ x 7 ¼ in. Provenance Dr. Ludwig Burchard, London Literature Giuseppe Scavizzi and Nicolas Schwed, Ferraù Fenzoni, Todi, 2006, pp.212 and 282, no.D62 3


SOFA

2 Circle of CLAUDE LORRAIN Chamagne 1604/5-1682 Rome

Prince Jean Cantacuzène, Paris (Lugt 4030) By descent to his son, Alexandre Cantacuzène, Paris His sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 4-6 June 1969, lot 506 (as circle of Claude) Private collection, France Private collection, Florida

Landscape with a Bridge over a River Pen and brown ink and brown wash, with framing lines in brown ink Numbered 404 in brown ink at the lower right 135 x 201 mm., 5 3/8 x 7 7/8 in.

This drawing bears the collector’s mark of the famous 18th century French collector and connoisseur Pierre-Jean Mariette, who regarded it as a work by Claude Lorrain. The drawing retained its attribution to Claude when in the collection of the Baron Malaussena, and throughout the 19th century, and has only recently been given to an anonymous contemporary of the master.

Provenance Pierre-Jean Mariette, Paris (Lugt 1852) Probably his sale, Paris, 15 November 1775 - 30 January 1776 François Alziari, Baron de Malaussena (Lugt 1887) His sale, Paris, 18-20 April 1866, lot 286 (as Claude), sold for 210 francs

A version or copy of the present sheet is in the Albertina in Vienna, where it is attributed to Pierre Lemaire (c.16121688), a follower of Nicolas Poussin. 4


SOFA

3 ITALIAN SCHOOL Circa 1700

maps and manuscripts, formed by the Piedmontese nobleman Cesare Saluzzo (1778-1853) – was acquired en bloc by the Royal Library in Turin in 1952. The present sheet, however, remained in the collection of drawings, books and manuscripts, mainly of the Italian school, in the possession of Tommaso Alberto Vittorio di Savoia-Genova, 2nd Duke of Genoa (1854-1931) and his eldest son, Ferdinando di Savoia-Genova (1884-1963), 3rd Duke of Genoa and Prince of Udine, before being sold and dispersed in the 1950’s.

A Choir of Angels with Musical Instruments Pen and two shades of brown ink and brown wash, over an underdrawing in black chalk 212 x 339 mm., 8 3/8 x 13 3/8 in. Provenance Probably Cesare Saluzzo, Turin The Dukes of Savoia-Genova (Lugt 47a), until sold in the 1950’s Giancarlo Baroni, Florence and Switzerland

An attribution to the Neapolitan painter Luca Giordano (1634-1705) has previously been suggested for this drawing, by stylistic comparison with two preparatory studies, in the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, for one of the major works of that artist’s late, Spanish period; the ceiling fresco of Allegory of the Golden Fleece in the Casón del Buen Retiro in Madrid, painted around 1697.

This drawing bears the collector’s mark recently identified as that of the Dukes of Savoia-Genova. The majority of the Savoia-Genova collection – some 17,000 drawings, prints, 5


SOFA

4 NICOLAS DE LARGILLIÈRE Paris 1656-1746 Paris

many of his formal portraits were reproduced as engravings, which served to further his reputation. The 18th century art historian Antoine-Joseph Dezallier d’Argenville wrote of Largillière that he worked directly on the canvas, without recourse to preparatory drawings, except for studies of heads, hands and drapery. Indeed, only a handful of drawings by the artist are known. It has been assumed that, when preparing his compositions, Largillière must have worked from drawings and oil sketches which he kept in his studio. One such oil sketch depicting various studies of hands, which can be related to several portraits by the artist, is in the Louvre. It has been suggested by one recent scholar that ‘Dezallier d’Argenville’s observation that Largilliere used few drawings can be explained by the fact that Largilliere preferred oil sketches to drawings, probably because the establishment of colour relationships was of primary importance to him’.

A Sheet of Studies of Hands and Arms Black, red and white chalk, on buff paper A portrait study of a cleric in black chalk on the verso 155 x 304 mm., 6 1/8 x 12 in. One of the leading portrait painters in France during the latter half of the reign of Louis XIV, Nicolas de Largillière was trained in Antwerp and London, settling in Paris in 1679. He soon established a reputation as a portrait painter, and as early as 1681 had painted a portrait of the King. Largillière was accepted into the Académie Royale in 1683, and later served twice as its Director. As well as members of the Royal family and the court, Largillière also painted portraits of the landed aristocracy and the haute bourgeoisie, as well as leading civil, religious and military figures. The success of his portraiture and the numerous commissions he received allowed the artist to amass a considerable fortune. From the beginning of his career

The attribution of this drawing, which may be dated to the end of the first decade of the 18th century, has been confirmed by Dominique Brême. A closely comparable sheet of studies of hands and arms by Largillière, also drawn in red and black chalk, is in a French private collection. 6


SOFA

5 MARCO RICCI Bellunno 1676-1730 Venice

collaborated. A landscape painter first and foremost, Ricci worked in Rome, Florence and Venice, and made the first of two trips to England in 1708, where he worked on the decoration of Castle Howard and designed scenery for the King’s Theatre, Haymarket. He also visited England for a second time with Sebastiano Ricci in 1712, returning to settle in Venice in 1717.

Landscape with Harvesters, a Castle Beyond Pen and brown ink and brown wash, laid down on a Vivant Denon mount Inscribed paese at the upper left centre Indistinctly inscribed Ricci anno del 1720 on the verso, laid down 193 x 287 mm., 7 5/8 x 11 ¼ in.

This charming, fresh landscape may have been intended as an independent work, like the artist’s better-known gouache landscapes. The chronology of these pen drawings is difficult to establish, as only two dated examples are known. Ricci would often keep these drawings in his studio, to be used as a source of pictorial motifs in his paintings and etchings.

Provenance Baron Dominique-Vivant Denon, Paris (Lugt 779 and on his mount) His sale, Paris, 1-19 May 1826, part of lot 553 Anonymous sale, New York, Christie’s, 12 January 1995, lot 49

The drawing bears the collector’s mark of DominiqueVivant Denon (1747-1825), the most powerful administrator of the arts in Napoleonic France. A diplomat, writer, archaeologist and engraver, he was also a discerning art collector. Denon’s collection of drawings numbered around 1,400 sheets, of which slightly more than half were by Italian artists.

Marco Ricci received his artistic training in the studio of his uncle Sebastiano Ricci, with whom he often later 7


SOFA

6 Attributed to ENNEMOND-ALEXANDRE PETITOT Lyons 1727-1801 Parma

The appearance of the temple in this drawing is derived from an etching by Giovanni Battista Piranes of a temple dedicated to Vesta, published in Rome in 1743. Although Piranesi’s etching is vertical in orientation and differs in both staffage and several architectural details from the present sheet, the close relationship between the two is readily evident.

Design for a Stage Curtain: The Interior of an Elaborate Temple Dedicated to Illustrious Men Pen and grey ink and grey wash Inscribed Petitot and Tempio della Gloria eretto alli Uomini Illustri, per servire di Sipario a Pavia on the verso 370 x 400 mm., 14 ½ x 15 ¾ in.

Petitot is likely to have made this drawing while a student in Paris, or as a pensionnaire at the Académie de France in Rome. Among stylistically comparable works by Petitot dating from his Roman period is his elaborate design for a temporary structure or macchina for the Roman firework festival of the Chinea in 1749, engraved several years later by Pierre Patte, as well as a Project for a Triumphal Bridge in Rome of c.1747, recorded in an engraving by the artist himself.

An architect as well as a designer of ephemeral decorations, Ennemond-Alexandre Petitot won the Premier Grand Prix de Rome at the Académie Royale d’Architecture in Paris in 1745. He studied at the Académie de France in Rome between 1746 and 1750, and in 1753 was appointed court architect to the Duke of Parma, where he worked for the remainder of his career.

The pencil inscription on the verso states that this drawing is a design for a stage curtain for a theatre in the Lombard town of Pavia. 8


GPFA

7 JOSEPH FARINGTON, R.A. Leigh 1747-1821 Disbury

Two studies of Kenilworth Castle, dated August 1791, are in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford (see Joseph Farington Watercolours and Drawings, exhibition catalogue, 1977, nos. 62 and 63, pp.60-61, ill. pp. 103-4). Farington drew a number of ruined castles and abbeys around 1790 which suggests he might have been assembling material for a book of engravings on the subject.

A Part of the ruin at Kenilworth Castle, Warwickshire Inscribed with title in another hand verso and dated 1791 Pen and brown ink and watercolour over pencil 164 x 237 mm., 6 ¼ x 9 ¼ in.

Kenilworth Castle stands on the edge of the town of the same name which is several miles south-west of Coventry. Originally Norman, the castle has been embellished over time. A Lancastrian base during the War of the Roses, it was partly destroyed by Parliamentarian forces during the Civil War. During the eighteenth century, it became a picturesque tourist attraction.

Provenance: Anonymous sale, Christie’s, 29th April 1986, lot 47; Stephen Unwin Collection

9


SOFA

8 ETIENNE AUBRY Versailles 1745-1781 Versailles

as such was agréé at the Academie Royale in 1771. He made his debut at the Salon the same year, exhibiting four portraits. His work as a portraitist gradually gave way to an interest in genre painting in the moralizing manner of JeanBaptiste Greuze. In fact, after exhibiting only portraits at the Salons of 1771 and 1773, in 1775 he submitted just one portrait, together with a number of genre scenes, while in 1777 and 1779 showed no portraits at all. Late in his career, Aubry determined to make his name as a history painter. He travelled to Rome in 1777 under the auspices of the Comte d’Angivillier, his most important patron. His history pictures did not, however, meet with much success, and in 1780 Aubry returned to France where he died the following year. His final attempt at the grand manner, Coriolanus Bidding Farewell to his Troops, was exhibited posthumously at the Salon of 1781.

The Offending Son (Le fils fautif) Oil on paper, laid down on canvas Inscribed Tableau de genre / Théaulon on a label attached to the former frame 339 x 466 mm., 13 ¼ x 18 3/8 in. One of the most interesting and talented painters working in France in the latter half of the 18th century, Etienne Aubry began his artistic training with Jacques Augustin de Silvestre, maître a dessiner des enfants de France, and later studied with Joseph Marie Vien. In the early years of his career, Aubry worked almost exclusively as a portrait painter, and 10


SOFA

9 FRENCH SCHOOL 18th Century

Provenance Edmond Fatio, Geneva (Lugt 3472) His sale, Geneva, Nicolas Rauch, 3-4 June 1959, lot 70 Curtis O. Baer, New Rochelle, NY (Lugt 3366) By descent to his son, George M. Baer, Atlanta, GA Katherine Woodward Mellon, Stonington, CT

A Quiver, Bow and Arrows Red chalk, heightened with white chalk, on buff paper 406 x 255 mm., 16 x 10 in. 11


GPFA

10 PAUL SANDBY, R.A. Nottingham 1731-1809 London

11 CHARLES TOMKINS London 1757-1823

Conway Castle from across the Estuary, North Wales

Rustics by a Cottage, a Windmill beyond; A Coach on a Country Track

Bodycolour on laid paper 200 x 279 mm., 7 他 x 11 in.

A pair, each signed on the original wash border: Chas Tomkins 1783 Pen and grey ink and watercolour on laid paper Oval 228 x 304 mm., 9 x 12 in.

Stylistically this appears to be an early work in bodycolour by Sandby drawn in the tradition of the Italian landscape artist Marco Ricci (see no. 5) whose work Sandby owned (for a similar work, see Luke Herrmann, Paul and Thomas Sandby, 1986, no. 5, p.83, ill.). His first recorded trip to Wales was in 1770 as a guest of his patron Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn so the present work is likely to date from the early 1770s.

The son of the landscape artist William Tomkins, Charles Tomkins specialised in topographical watercolours and engravings. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1773 until 1781. A number of his London views are in the British Museum. 12


GPFA

13


GPFA

12 GEORGE FROST Ipswich 1734-1821 Ipswich

Frost was an office clerk in Ipswich who spent his leisure time sketching in the local area. His friend the Rev. James Ford recalled: ‘he studied nature with the closest attention’ and ‘the pleasing scenery around the town of Ipswich; its hollow and tortuous lanes with broken sand-banks; its copsegrown dells; above all, the richly-wooded and picturesque acclivities of its winding river, were his perpetual haunts’ (obituary in The Gentleman’s Magazine, July 1821, p. 90).

A Gate on a Country Track With collector’s mark lower right: WE Black chalk on laid paper watermarked with Britannia and dated 1809 271 x 228 mm., 10 ¼ x 9 in.

He was an ardent admirer of Gainsborough’s landscape drawings, and a close friend of Constable, and he owned a number of his drawings. Some of his Gainsborough drawings were later acquired by the collector William Esdaile, whose sale of drawings in 1838 included over 200 works by George Frost including, presumably, the present work.

Provenance: William Esdaile (1758-1837)

14


GPFA

a.

b. 13 THOMAS UWINS, R.A. Pentonville 1782-1857 Staines a. Study of a Plant

b. A Woman and Child on a Bridge near Oxford

Inscribed lower right: Study from Nature by T. Uwins/Early and indistinctly inscribed upper right Pen and brown ink on blue laid paper 166 x 206 mm., 6 ½ x 8 in.

Signed lower left: Near Oxford. T. Uwins pencil 189 x 284 mm., 7 ¼ x 11 in.

15


SOFA

a.

b.

c. 16


SOFA

14 FLORENT-FIDÈLE-CONSTANT BOURGEOIS Guiscard 1767-1841 Passy

15 ROBERT VEITH Dresden 1810-? Vienna

a. The Courtyard of an Italian Monastery b. A Palazzo in the Roman Campagna c. The Vaults of the Palazzo Comunale in Anagni

Panoramic Landscape near Dresden with a Country Estate Pen and black ink, laid down on a contemporary mount Signed and dated R. Veith. fecit 1831. in the lower right margin of the mount Further inscribed (in a modern hand) R. Veith fec. 1831 and numbered 541 on the backing sheet. 129 x 334 mm. (5 1/8 x 13 1/8 in.) [sheet]

Each pen and brown ink and brown wash, over a pencil underdrawing a. Signed with initials and dated CB / 1807 at the lower left b. Inscribed a Saura près d’Isola on the verso c. Inscribed vue et [?] des prisons sous le Palais / de Justice à Anagni on the verso a. & c. 102 x 141 mm., 4 x 5 ½ in. b. 101 x 147 mm., 4 x 5 ¾ in.

Little is known of the life and career of Robert Maximilian Veith, the younger son of the landscape painter Johann Philipp Veith (1768-1837). He studied in his native Dresden in the 1820’s and in later years settled in Vienna, where he worked as a lithographer.

Provenance Prince Poniatowski A pupil of Jacques-Louis David, Florent Constant Bourgeois (known as Bourgeois du Castelet) was a landscape painter, draughtsman and printmaker. He spent much of his career in Italy, from which he sent numerous drawings of picturesque Italian views that were shown at the Salons between 1791 and 1831. Bourgeois’s highly finished landscape drawings, which also included views in France and Switzerland, were popular with collectors. In 1804 a series of engravings after Italian views by Bourgeois were published as the Receuil de vues et fabriques pittoresques d’Italie. He was also commissioned by Dominique-Vivant Denon to produce a series of drawings recording the military campaigns of Napoleon; these are now in the Louvre. 17


SOFA

16 JEAN-MICHEL MOREAU, called MOREAU LE JEUNE Paris 1741-1814 Paris

Regarded as one of the greatest French illustrators of the 18th century, Jean-Michel Moreau established a successful career as a draughtsman and engraver, and in 1770 was appointed dessinateur des menus-plaisirs, in which role he was tasked with recording the official events and ceremonies of the French court. As a book ilustrator, he provided illustrations for works by Rousseau, Molière, La Borde, Voltaire and others. He was received as a full member of the Académie Royale in 1789. Following the French Revolution – of which he was a supporter – he continued to work as an illustrator. At the very end of his life, however, a cancerous growth on his right arm left him unable to draw.

A Design for a Chapter Heading, with a Bust of Athena and Emblems of the Arts and Sciences Pen and brown ink and brown wash, over traces of a pencil underdrawing Signed and dated J. M. Moreau , Le J.ne 1812. at the lower right 125 x 199 mm., 4 7/8 x 7 7/8 in. Provenance Marie-Joseph-François Mahérault, Paris His posthumous sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 27-29 May 1880, lot 207

This drawing was once in the collection of the 19th century art historian Marie-Joseph-François Mahérault (1795-1879), who compiled the first catalogue raisonné of Moreau’s work. Mahérault’s collection of drawings, dispersed at auction the year after his death, included nearly three hundred sheets by the artist.

Literature M.-J.-F. Mahérault, L’oeuvre de Moreau le Jeune: Catalogue raisonné et descriptif, Paris, 1880, p.500, no.569 18


GPFA

17 WILLIAM HAVELL Reading 1782-1857 London Landscape with a Castle Grey washes over pencil on laid paper 171 x 256 mm., 6 ž x 10 in. Provenance: With Thomas Agnews & Sons (no. 45093) This early drawing, dating from 1803-4, is almost certainly a sketching Society drawing and shows the influence of John Sell Cotman. The Sketching Society was a group of artists who would meet weekly in the evening in winter in order to draw their own version of a pre-ordained subject matter. Cotman and Havell were at the same meeting at least twice in late 1803 (see William Havell, exhibition catalogue, 1981, p. 36, no. 107) and Cotman’s version of this subject is in the Victoria and Albert Museum (see Jean Hamilton, The Sketching Society 1799-1851, 1971, pl. 6). 19


GPFA

a. 18 JOHN VARLEY Hackney 1778-1842 London

c. Mountains, North Wales

a. Study of a Tree

Inscribed on border: by J. Varley Pencil on Whatman paper dated 1816 Sheet 160 x 254 mm., 6 ¼ x 10 in.

Signed or inscribed on mount: J. Varley Pencil with a study of a nude verso 246 x 168 mm., 9 ½ x 6 ½ in.

These three mannered drawings by Varley are likely to have been used as teaching tools and date from 1815-25. For a similar drawing, dated 1824, in the V and A Museum, see C.M. Kauffmann, John Varley1984, no. 43, ill. p.146.

b. Figures on a Path near a Cottage Pencil and brown wash with drawn border Sheet 189 x 234 mm., 7 ¼ x 10 ¾ in. 20


GPFA

b.

c. 21


GPFA

19 JOHN VARLEY Hackney 1778-1842 London Study of a House Signed lower left: J. Varley Black and white chalk on blue paper 278 x 365 mm., 10 ¾ x 14 ¼ in. Provenance: Angela Hornyold-Strickland, Sizergh Castle, Cumbria Varley produced a number of watercolours of a similar house on the Thames at Barnes (for an example, see Adrian Bury, John Varley of the “Old Society”, 1946, pl. 6). 22


GPFA

a.

b. 20 JOHN LINNELL Bloomsbury 1792-1882 Redhill

b. A Boatyard by the Thames, London

a. Study of a Wherry on the Thames, London

Signed lower left: J Linnell f. Black and white chalk on blue paper 162 x 241 mm., 6 ¼ x 9 ½ in.

Signed lower left: J Linnell f. Black and white chalk on blue paper 148 x 216 mm., 5 ¾ x 8 ½ in.

These rare early drawings by Linnell can be dated to between 1805 and 1809 when he was taught by John Varley. (see no. 19). 23


GPFA

22 ROBERT HILLS Islington 1769-1844 London a. A Pond in a Farmyard 21 WILLIAM PAYNE London 1760-1830 London

Watercolour and pencil 147 x 219 mm., 5 ¾ x 8 ½ in.

View of a Waterfall

b. Epsom Downs looking towards Fetcham and Bookham, Surrey

Watercolour 141 x 198 mm., 5 ½ x 7 ¾ in. Provenance: With the Tamar Gallery, Launceston, Cornwall

Inscribed lower left: Epsom Downs looking towards Fetcham and Bookham Watercolour over pencil 148 x 217 mm., 5 ¾ x 8 ½ in.

We are grateful to David Japes who was suggested that this dates from 1810-12 and is likely to be a view in North Wales or the Lake District.

This is a view looking south-west from the Epsom Downs towards Fetcham, Little and Great Bookham and what is now Leatherhead. 24


GPFA

a.

b. 25


GPFA

23 FREDERICK WILLIAM WATTS Bath 1800-1870 Hampstead

Provenance: With Hugh Scarf from whom bought by Ralph Holland (1917-2012), circa 1958

At Castle Bromwich, Warwickshire

Castle Bromwich is five miles east of the centre of Birmingham and was a village in the nineteenth century. Castle Bromwich Hall was the home of the Barons (later Earls) of Bradford. F.W. Watts lived in Hampstead for most of his life and exhibited landscapes at the Royal Academy, British Institution and elsewhere. He was a close follower of John Constable in style.

Inscribed lower left: At Castle Bromwich and lower centre: July 18th ‘26 pencil 459 x 367 mm., 18 x 14 Âź in.

26


SOFA

24 JEAN-IGNACE-ISIDORE GÉRARD, called J. J. GRANDVILLE Nancy 1803-1847 Vanves

who commissioned stories from Honoré de Balzac, Alfred de Musset and other writers to accompany the drawings. The Scènes de la vie privée et publique des animaux was issued in a hundred instalments between November 1840 and December 1842, and the complete set was published in two volumes in 1842.

A Frog in an Overcoat, Holding a Top Hat and Cane Pen and brown ink and watercolour 224 x 173 mm., 8 ¾ x 6 ¾ in.

The present sheet was used to illustrate a story by Louis Francois L’Héritier de l’Ain, entitled ‘Pérégrination mémoriale du doyen des crapauds’. Taking the form of a reminiscence by an old toad, the story tells tales of his youthful adventures. Grandville’s drawing of an elegantly dressed frog, bearing the caption ‘Les doyen des Crapauds’, served as the frontispiece to the story.

This drawing is related to J. J. Grandville’s illustrations for the Scènes de la vie privée et publique des animaux. This remarkable work, based entirely around Grandville’s animal drawings, was the idea of the publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel, 27


GPFA

25 NEWTON SMITH LIMBIRD FIELDING London 1799-1856 Paris Lapwing and Game Birds Signed lower centre: Newton Fielding 1856 Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour, gum arabic and scratching out 146 x 198 mm., 5 他 x 7 他 in. Provenance: With Anthony Reed, 3 Cork St, London, circa 1980 Newton Fielding is the younger brother of Anthony Vandyke Copley Fielding (1787-1855) and ran the family engraving business in Paris from 1827 with William Callow working for him. He is best known for his animal and bird studies. 28


GPFA

a.

b.

26 JAMES WARD, R.A. London 1769-1859 Cheshunt

b. Study of Ragwort Signed with initials lower left and inscribed in pencil: …. Weeds Watercolour and pencil 130 x 105 mm., 5 x 4 in.

a. Study of a Cuckoo Flower Signed lower right: JW. RA and inscribed in pencil: Cuckoo Flower – ap.l 1820 Watercolour and pencil 168 x 111 mm., 6 ½ x 4 ¼ in.

Provenance: Mr Knowles of Hanwell by 1951; Prudence Summerhayes by 1959; By descent until 20008

Provenance: Mr Knowles of Hanwell by 1951; Prudence Summerhayes by 1959; By descent until 20008 29


SOFA

27 FRANÇOIS-FORTUNÉ-ANTOINE FEROGIO Marseille 1805-1888 Paris

28 FRENCH SCHOOL 19th Century

A Country Picnic

An Artist Seated at an Easel

Coloured chalks on blue paper Signed Ferogio at the lower right 221 x 427 mm., 8 ¾ x 6 ¾ in. [image] 297 x 448 mm., 11 ¾ x 17 5/8 in. [sheet]

Pencil Inscribed Dessin au crayon / extrait de l’album / de la collection / Hélène Boitte on the verso 136 x 110 mm., 5 3/8 x 4 3/8 in.

Admitted into the studio of Baron Gros at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in 1825, François Ferogio worked mostly in pastel and watercolour, usually on a fairly small scale. He exhibited regularly at the Salons between 1831 and 1880, and also produced lithographs, designs for faience, and book illustrations. Among the latter were a series of seventy vignettes for the Comtesse de Ségur’s Les bons enfants, published in 1862, and illustrations for Théodore Barrau’s Amour filial, published in 1880. A large group of drawings by Ferogio, including landscapes, historical and genre scenes, is in the Musée Fabre in Montpellier, while paintings by the artist are in the museums of Montpellier and La Rochelle.

Provenance Hélène Boitte (according to a note on the verso) Albert van Loock, Brussels (Lugt 3751), his stamp on the verso Private collection, France The verso of the present sheet bears the stamp of the Belgian dealer in prints and drawings Albert van Loock (born 1917), who worked from a gallery on the Rue Saint-Jean in Brussels after 1949. The stamp was applied to drawings and prints that he sold.

30


SOFA

31


GPFA

29 THOMAS PEPLOE WOOD Stafford 1817-1845 Stafford

Born in Great Haywood near Stafford, Thomas Peploe Wood was one of the six sons of a tollgate keeper and selftaught as an artist. In the 1830s, he drew the attention of a local architect Thomas Trubshaw who took him to London in 1836 and introduced him to various patrons. Thanks to these introductions, he exhibited at the Royal Academy and sold various drawings to Colnaghi’s. Much of his subject matter is Staffordshire views although he made an extensive tour of England, Scotland and Ireland in 1838. His most important patron was William Salt who was collecting material for a history of Staffordshire, and his collection is now in the William Salt Library in Stafford. Wood died of tuberculosis aged 28.

Scouting the Beat; Playing the Fish A pair, watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour and scratching out Each 162 x 234 mm., 6 ¼ x 9 ¼ in. Provenance: With Arthur Ackermann & Son Ltd, 3 Bond St., London, 1960s 32


SOFA

30 GASPARD GOBAUT Paris 1814-1882 Paris

Siméon Fort and Theodor Jung. He began his career in 1836 as a military draughtsman, attached to the Ministry of Defence, and continued to work in this capacity throughout much of his career. Gobaut exhibited at the annual Salons between 1840 and 1878, showing almost exclusively watercolour landscapes, and won a bronze medal at the Salon of 1847. Among the subjects of his watercolours were scenes from the North African campaigns of the French army, views of Paris, Swiss mountain views and landscapes in Algeria and Morocco. In 1871 he was admitted to the Legion d’Honneur. Works by Gobaut are today in the collection of the Duc d’Aumale at Chantilly, the Musée Carnavalet in Paris, at Versailles and in the museums of Pontoise and Honfleur. A group of twelve watercolour views of Paris and its environs by Gobaut was formerly in the David-Weill collection and dispersed at auction in Paris in 1971.

Landscape with a Mill Watercolour, with touches of bodycolour Signed, dated and dedicated à mon bon ami Sabourin - Gobaut 1870 at the lower right 270 x 371 mm., 10 5/8 x 14 5/8 in. Provenance Presented by the artist to a M. Sabourin, according to the dedication on the sheet Best known for his watercolours of landscapes, military subjects and battle scenes, Gaspard Gobaut was a pupil of 33


GPFA

31 PETER DE WINT Stone 1784-1849 London

De Wint exhibited two views of Kent at the Society of Painters in Water-colours in 1846, ‘Canterbury’ (no. 37) and ‘Dover, from the road to Canterbury’ (no. 107).

A House at Tonbridge, Kent

The numbering in the lower right corner suggests this drawing may have been part of the artist’s studio sale at Christie’s from 22-24 May 1850. Lot 264 was described as ‘Near Tonbridge’ and was bought by Vokins for 4 guineas.

Inscribed lower right: 64 and verso: at Tonbridge/9th Septr 1845 Watercolour over pencil 292 x 462 mm., 11 ½ x 18 in. 34


GPFA

a.

b.

32 WILLIAM HENRY HUNT London 1790-1864 London a. A Dog resting its head

b. Study of a Cow being milked

Signed lower right: W. HUNT pencil 51 x 65 mm., 2 x 2 ½ in.

Signed lower right: W. HUNT pencil 91 x 126 mm., 3 ½ x 5 in. 35


GPFA

33 DAVID COX Birmingham 1783-1859 Birmingham

almost every summer afterwards. The present drawing dates from his visit there in September 1852 according to an inscription on the reverse. The scenery in the surrounding area is especially dramatic. Solly in his biography of Cox described it as follows: ‘It is surrounded by rocky glens and deep wooded valleys..... Through these the mountain streams, the Machno, the Lledr, and the Llugwy, flow on towards their junction with the Conway.... All these streams are spanned by old and picturesque bridges, well known to lovers of art and Welsh scenery, and their banks also adorned by several ancient water-mills; of these, Pandy Mill, on the Machno, is the chief, on account of its romantic situation and the fine old oaks which surround it’ (see N. Neal Solly, Memoir of the Life of David Cox, reprinted 1973, p.158-9).

Near Pandy Mill, North Wales Inscribed verso in another hand: N.r Pandy Mill by D. Cox Sept.r 52 Watercolour over black chalk heightened with stopping out on oatmeal paper 278 x 373 mm., 10 ¾ x 14 ½ in. Pandy Mill is situated on the river Machno near its junction with the river Conway, two miles south-east of Bettws-yCoed. Cox visited Bettws in 1844 and returned there 36


GPFA

34 DAVID COX Birmingham 1783-1859 Birmingham

Cox made a number of sketching tours of Yorkshire in the 1840s, the period of the present watercolour. He is known to have drawn on the Wharfe at Bolton Abbey and Barden in September 1841, August 1843 and September 1844. Barden Tower is a fifteenth century hunting lodge which stands above the Wharfe river several miles north of Bolton Abbey.

Fisherman on the river Wharfe near Barden Tower, Yorkshire Signed lower left: David Cox Watercolour and black chalk 212 x 283 mm., 8 Âź x 11 in.

Stylistically this and no. 33 are typical of Cox’s late period with extensive use of black chalk under the watercolour.

Provenance: Edward V. Phillips 37


SOFA

35 GEORGE SAND Paris 1804-1876 Nohant

Towards the very end of her life – it is first mentioned, as an amusement, in a letter of February 1874 – George Sand began producing watercolour drawings, using a distinctive technique, which she called ‘dendrites’, comparing them with the appearance of fossilized plants. These drawings were produced by applying pigment (often green) to a sheet of thick Bristol paper and, while it was still wet, pressing another sheet of paper on top of it. The random shapes created by this method of mixing pigments would then be worked on by the artist with watercolours, creating imaginary landscapes. Sand also referred to the technique as ‘aquarelle à l’écrasage’ (‘crushed watercolour)’ and, as she described these works, ‘This crushing produced ridges which are sometimes curious. Assisting my imagination, I see woods, forests or lakes, and I accentuate the vague shapes produced by chance.’ A number of these ‘dendrite’ watercolours are today in the Louvre, while others are in the collections of the Musée de la Vie Romantique in Paris and Sand’s home at the Château de Nohant, as well as in several private collections.

Mountainous Landscape with a Lake and Waterfalls Watercolour, gouache and dendrite on paper 151 x 204 mm., 5 7/8 x 8 in. Provenance Acquired in 1967 by the University Art Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, until de-accessioned in 2012 The French Romantic novelist, playwright and memoirist Amantine Lucile Dupin is better known by her pseudonym George Sand, which she adopted from around 1831 onwards. A prolific writer and essayist, Sand was also notorious for her affairs with several distinguished men, notably a ten-year relationship with Frédéric Chopin. 38


SOFA

36 EDWIN LORD WEEKS Boston 1849-1903 Paris

Exhibited Durham, University of New Hampshire, The Art of Edwin Lord Weeks, 1976, no.23

Trees and a Wall in Jerusalem Pencil on paper; a page from a large sketchbook Inscribed and dated Jerusalem Oct. 8th at the lower left Further inscribed Elizabeth Goodwin and numbered 3. on the verso 254 x 367 mm., 10 x 14 ½ in.

Arguably the finest American painter of Orientalist subjects, Edwin Lord Weeks made his home in Paris, where he exhibited with great success at the annual Salons. He travelled widely in the Near East and North Africa, and between 1882 and 1893 also made three long trips to India. His views of India and Indian life proved extremely popular with French and American collectors, and became his particular specialty.

Provenance The artist’s niece, Elizabeth Goodwin By descent to Burton W. F. Trafton, Jr., South Berwick, Maine Mervyn E. Bronson, Portland, Maine Bernard Broder, Gorham, Maine

The present sheet is part of a large collection of paintings, drawings and oil sketches by Weeks, many dating from the years before his studies in Paris, which remained with the artist’s descendants until recently. Views in Palestine are rare in Week’s oeuvre; a painting of The Temple Mount in Jerusalem by the artist appeared at auction in London in 2010. 39


GPFA

37 THOMAS LOUND 1802-1861 Norwich Crowland Abbey, Lincolnshire Watercolour over pencil heightened with touches of bodycolour 308 x 494 mm., 12 x 19 ½ in. Provenance: Graham W. Jay, his sale, Christie’s, 1st March 1977, lot 171; With Mandell’s Gallery, Norwich Lound was a pupil of John Sell Cotman who joined the Norwich Society in 1820 and exhibited there until 1833. He exhibited in London in the 1840s and 1850s. His subjects are mostly Norfolk views. The ruins of Crowland or Croyland Abbey stand eight miles north-east of Peterborough in Lincolnshire. They were famously painted by John Sell Cotman (British Museum). 40


GPFA

38 ROBERT LEMAN Norwich 1799-1863 Norwich A Gate by a Wood Watercolour over traces of pencil 230 x 355 mm., 9 x 14 in. Provenance: With Andrew Wyld, 3 Cork St, London, circa 1980 Leman was a talented landscape artist who was a follower of John Sell Cotman in Norwich. He was a member of the Norwich Amateur Club in the 1830s, exhibiting at the Norwich Society and was a friend of many of the later generation of Norwich School artists. The depiction of the gate is reminiscent of Cotman’s ‘Drop Gate, Duncombe Park’ in the British Museum. 41


GPFA

39 JOHN VARLEY Hackney 1778-1842 London Brecon on the River Usk, South Wales Inscribed verso by the artist’s grandson, Herbert Varley: I certify that this is an original drawing/by old John Varley/Born 1778/Died 1842/Herbt. Varley/Grandson/6th August 1899 and with collector’s mark verso Watercolour over pencil 216 x 362 mm., 8 ½ x 14 ¼ in. Provenance: By descent from the artist to his grandson Herbert Varley (d.1903); Michael Ingram Brecon is a market town in south Powys and was previously the county town of the old county of Brecknockshire. Beyond the bridge over the Usk stands Brecon Priory, known since 1923 as Brecon Cathedral, with the old Norman castle to the left. A fully finished watercolour of this view by Varley dated 1837 was with Guy Peppiatt Fine Art in 2009 (Summer Catalogue no. 33). 42


GPFA

40 ANTHONY VANDYKE COPLEY FIELDING Sowerby Bridge 1787-1855 Worthing The Head of Loch Etive, Argyllshire Signed lower right: Copley Fielding 1842 Watercolour over pencil heightened with scratching out and gum arabic 203 x 305 mm., 8 x 12 in. Provenance: With Thomas Deans Fine Art, USA; With Andrew Wyld Exhibited: London, Society of Painters in Watercolours, 1842, no. 282 Loch Etive is a long Loch which enters the sea at Connel north of Oban on the west coast of Scotland. This is a view looking north-east to the head of the loch with Ben Trilleachan on the left. 43


GPFA

a.

b. 41 WILLIAM COLLINGWOOD, R.W.S. Greenwich 1819-1903 Bristol

b. View of Dover Harbour, Kent

a. View of Dartmouth Castle on the river Dart, Devon

Pencil on buff paper 322 x 497 mm., 12 ½ x 19 ½ in.

Pencil on buff paper 342 x 502 mm., 13 ½ x 19 ¾ in.

These early works by Collingwood date from the late 1830s. 44


GPFA

42 JAMES DUFFIELD HARDING Deptford 1797-1863 Barnes

Provenance: Sir Thomas Lucas of 12a Kensington Palace Gardens, his sale, Christie’s, 9th June 1902, lot 170, bt. Vokins for 11 guineas; William Cooke of North Bank, Muswell Hill, his sale, Christie’s, 8th June 1917, lot 30, bt. Matthews for 18 guineas

View in the Alps Signed lower left: JDHarding/1841 Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour 323 x 208 mm., 11 ½ x 8 in.

This is likely to be a preparatory watercolour for an engraving. 45


SOFA

43 DOMENICO MORELLI Naples 1823-1901 Naples

style was to have a particular influence on both his paintings and drawings. The 1880’s found Morelli painting mostly religious subjects, often tinged with a form of mysticism. His draughtsmanship is characterized by rapid, short pen strokes with a minimum of shading. Morelli’s pen style as a draughtsman was largely developed by around 1865 and remained relatively constant for the rest of his career.

A Seated Arab Man Pen and brown ink, with touches of brown wash Signed and dated Morelli 1883 at the lower right, and illegibly inscribed (in mock Arabic?) at the bottom 445 x 323 mm., 17 ½ x 12 ¾ in.

Orientalist or Islamic subjects account for a small but distinctive part of Morelli’s painted oeuvre. He never seems to have visited the Near East, although he owned a large collection of photographs of sites in the Holy Land and elsewhere. The model depicted here also appears in Morelli’s painting of an Arab musician playing a musical instrument, datable to the mid-1870’s, in a private collection.

Domenico Morelli lived and worked in Naples, and also made several trips to Paris between 1854 and 1867. Among his paintings are scenes from Italian literature and history, religious subjects and the occasional portrait. In 1874 he met the Spanish artist Mariano Fortuny, whose 46


GPFA

a.

b. 44 THOMAS HARTLEY CROMEK London 1809-1873 Wakefield

b. The Arch of Constantine and the Colosseum, Rome Watercolour over traces of pencil 140 x 243 mm., 5 ½ x 9 ½ in.

a. The Basilica of St Francis of Assisi, Italy

These on-the-spot sketches by Cromek date from his time in Rome in the 1830s and 1840s. For more on the artist, see Thomas Hartley Cromek: A Vision of Italy, exhibition catalogue, 1999.

Watercolour over traces of pencil 131 x 244 mm., 5 x 9 ½ in.

47


GPFA

45 WILLIAM JAMES MÜLLER Bristol 1802-1845 Bristol

Birmingham, City Museum and Art Gallery, a Loan Collection of Paintings in Oil and Water-colours by William J. Müller, 1896

The Room of Marie de Medici, Château of Blois, France

In the Spring of 1840, Müller was commissioned by Messrs Hodgson and Graves of Pall Mall to produce forty watercolours of French views which related to the Renaissance period of Francis I. Of these forty, twenty-six were to be lithographed for a book ‘Sketches of the Age of Francis I’. Müller left from Southampton with his pupil Edward Dighton in early June and visited various sites in Normandy reaching Paris on the 17th. After a month there and at Fontainebleau, he visited Orleans, Blois and the Loire valley before returning to England from St Malo in September. A watercolour of this view was published as plate XIII of ‘Sketches of the Age of Francis I’ in 1841, but with different figures.

Signed and dated 1841 lower left Watercolour heightened with touches of bodycolour and scratching out 195 x 271 mm., 7 ¾ x 10 ½ in. Provenance: John Edward Taylor (1830-1905) Exhibited: Leeds City Art Gallery, National Exhibition of Works of Art, 1868, no.15; 48


GPFA

a.

b.

46 WILLIAM JAMES MÜLLER Bristol 1802-1845 Bristol

b. Heidelberg from the banks of the river Neckar, Germany Signed with initials lower centre: Entrance to Heidelberg 1834 WM. August. pencil 417 x 282 mm., 16 ¼ x 11 in.

a. The Round Tower at Andernach on the Rhine Signed with initials lower right: Andernach 1834/wm pencil 442 x 291 mm., 17 ¼ x 11 ½ in.

Provenance: Robert H. Edmondson; By descent to T.A. Edmondson; With the Sabin Gallery, London; With the Motcombe Galleries, London

Provenance: Robert H. Edmondson; By descent to T.A. Edmondson; With the Sabin Gallery, London; With the Motcombe Galleries, London

This dates from Müller’s seven month tour of the continent with his fellow artist George Arthur Fripp in the summer of 1834 and early 1835. They crossed the Channel in mid July and continued to Cologne. From there, they walked down the banks of the Rhine to Heidelberg which was their first prolonged stop.

The ‘Round Tower’, completed in 1453, is part of the medieval fortifications of Andernach which stands on the Rhine several miles north of Koblenz.

49


GPFA

47 HARRY T. HINE London 1845-1941 Bottesdale, Suffolk Great Ote Hall near Wivelsfield Green, West Sussex Signed lower right: Harry Hine 1875 Watercolour heightened with bodycolour and stopping out 300 x 398 mm., 11 他 x 15 他 in. This is an early work by Harry Hine the son of the artist Henry George Hine. Great Ote Hall, an Elizabethan manor house, dates from circa 1550 with an east wing added in 1600 and still exists today. 50


GPFA

48 ANTHONY VANDYKE COPLEY FIELDING Sowerby Bridge 1787-1855 Worthing

The mountain of Ben Vorlich stands between the town of Callander to the south and Loch Earn. Copley Fielding exhibited a number of views of Ben Vorlich at the Society of Painters in Water-colours but most are taken from the banks of Loch Lomond.

Ben Vorlich, South Highlands, Scotland Signed lower centre: Copley Fielding/1828 Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour, scratching out and stopping out 477 x 617 mm., 18 ¾ x 24 ¼ in. Provenance: Mrs Henry Folland of Llynderw Lodge, Blackpyl near Swansea, his sale Christie’s, 5th October 1945, lot 1, sold for £89 51


GPFA

49 GEORGE PYNE 1800-1884

Provenance: Anonymous sale, Christie’s, 25th July 1972, lot 246 Oxford Castle is a mostly ruined medieval castle to the west of the centre of the city. It is dominated by St. George’s Tower which dates from 1074. George Pyne is best known for his views of Oxford colleges.

Castle Mill Stream and the Castle, Oxford Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour 200 x 151 mm., 7 ¾ x 5 ¾ in. 52


GPFA

50 ATTRIBUTED TO AMBROSE POYNTER London 1796-1886 Dover

This unusual view of Greenwich looks south down Church St from the river towards the Hawksmoor-designed church of St Alfege’s. Stylistically this watercolour, which is indistinctly signed, is very close to the work of the London artist and architect Ambrose Poynter (for a comparable watercolour, see Stephen Duffy, The Discovery of Paris – Watercolours by Early Nineteenth-Century British Artists, 2013, no. 58, p. 122).

Church St., Greenwich with St Alfege’s Church beyond Indistinctly signed and dated 1845 lower centre Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour 337 x 242 mm., 13 ¼ x 9 ½ in. 53


GPFA

51 EDWARD LEAR Highgate 1812-1888 San Remo

Lear visited Melfi from 17th to 22nd September 1847 while he was living in Rome. Having visited Sicily in May and June 1847, he toured Southern Italy from July until October. He described the castle as ‘sufficiently imposing at this silent hour of night. There is a drawbridge, and sullen gates, and dismal court-yards, and massive towers, and seneschals with keys and fierce dogs – all the requisites of the feudal fortress of romance’ (see Edward Lear in Southern Italy, 1964, pp. 182-184). Melfi is in the central southern area of Basilicata to the east of Naples.

The Castle of Melfi, Italy Inscribed lower left: Melfi/Sept 21 and inscribed in another hand lower right: J.W. Turner Pen and brown ink and washes heightened with white on grey paper 208 x 291 mm., 8 x 11 ¼ in. 54


GPFA

52 EDWARD LEAR Highgate 1812-1888 San Remo

This drawing dates from Lear’s time in Rome from late 1837 until 1848 when he often worked in pencil or black chalk. The lack of inscription suggests it’s a studio work and maybe preparatory for an engraving or larger drawing.

Castello di Baia near Naples, Italy

The castle of Baia, several miles west of Naples, is perched on a cliff top overlooking the Mediterranean. The current fortress was built by the Aragonese in the late fifteenth century on a cliff above Roman ruins which purport to be Julius Caesar’s summer residence. They are more likely to have built by the Emperor Nero however.

Pencil heightened with white on grey paper 119 x 231 mm., 4 ½ x 9 in.

55


SOFA

53 EUGÈNE BOUDIN Honfleur 1824-1898 Deauville

Eugène Boudin seems to have made his first visit to Holland in 1873, perhaps at the suggestion of the artist Johan Barthold Jongkind, and returned several times in his later career, working in Rotterdam, The Hague and Dordrecht. The present sheet dates from 1876, when the artist spent the months of June and July in the Low Countries, and that year he painted at least nine paintings of Vues de Rotterdam, including some of the fish market.

A Fish Market in Rotterdam Watercolour over an underdrawing in pencil Stamped with the atelier stamp E.B. (Lugt 828) at the lower left Inscribed and dated Rotterdam. -76 at the lower right, and further inscribed with colour notes 159 x 202 mm.; 6 1/4 x 8 in.

Boudin’s notebooks, which he used to record ideas and thoughts related to his work, reveal his fondness for markets, and particularly fish markets, as pictorial subjects. These notebooks included such notes to himself as ‘Fishmarkets. There is a gold mine to be exploited. How many have I sketched? If I apply myself I should produce a certain number with figures of a foot or so. Trouville, and Rotterdam – consider’, as well as ‘A large market with the people shown on their striking side. For that all the material must be gathered on the spot.’

Provenance The studio of the artist Probably the Boudin atelier sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 20-21 March 1899 Mr. and Mrs. Fred Schoneman, New York, by 1976 Private collection, Scotland 56


GPFA

54 HERCULES BRABAZON BRABAZON Paris 1821-1906 Oaklands, Sussex Pella on Lake Orta, Italy Signed lower left: Pella/Lago di Orta/HBB Watercolour and pencil heightened with touches of bodycolour 140 x 216 mm., 5 ½ x 8 ½ in. Pella is on the west bank of Lake Orta, one of the North Italian lakes. 57


GPFA

55 NOEL ROOKE Bedford Park 1881-1953 Bedford Park

to Birmingham City Art Gallery. The 1899 watercolour of the west front of Bourges Cathedral is still in the museum’s collection. He was evidently accompanied by his 18 year old son Noel who produced the present watercolour.

Study of the west Façade of Bourges Cathedral, France

Noel was educated at the Lyceé de Chartres before entering the Central School of Arts and Crafts in 1899. There he was taught by the calligrapher Edward Johnston and his fellow pupils included Eric Gill. In 1905 he became the teacher of Book Illustration at the Central School and became increasingly interested in wood engraving. In 1914 he became head of the School of Book Production, a post he held until 1946. In 1920 he helped to found the Society of Wood Engravers. His teachings were a major factor in the revival of wood engraving in the twentieth century.

Signed with initials lower right: N.R./1899 and inscribed on border under mount: 7 Queen Anne’s Gardens/Bedford Park/W./With another drawing/Submitted at National Gallery 26.th Oct 1899 Watercolour over traces of pencil 313 x 636 mm., 12 ¼ x 25 in. Noel was the son of the artist Thomas Matthew Rooke (1842-1942) who was a designer for Burne-Jones and also worked for Ruskin. T.M. Rooke visited Bourges in 1899, one of the annual trips arranged by Sydney Cockerell, the idea being to produce a major watercolour to be presented

A watercolour by Noel Rooke, of the same size, of the main portal of Senlis Cathedral, France, dated 1900, is in the Harvard Art Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

58


SOFA

56 GEORGE LAWRENCE BULLEID A.R.W.S. Glastonbury 1858-1933 Bath?

range of subjects is narrow, consisting almost entirely of female figures in classical settings, the intense clarity of his vision, combined with an astonishing level of technical accomplishment, mark him out as much more than just another Alma-Tadema follower.’ Bulled worked mainly in watercolour, and exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy, the Royal Watercolour Society and the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours. As The Studio magazine noted, in a review of an exhibition of the Bath Society of Artists in 1905, ‘Two drawings by G. Lawrence Bulleid, A.R.W.S, have the intricacy of design, pure colour and wealth of detail beautifully drawn which are associated with his name.’ The present sheet is unusual in the artist’s oeuvre in being a depiction of a young girl in contemporary dress.

A Young Girl in a Straw Hat Watercolour on paper laid down on board Signed G . LAWRENCE . BULLEID at the upper left 203 x 178 mm., 8 x 7 in. George Bulleid is best known as a painter of highly finished paintings and watercolours of subjects from classical antiquity, in the manner of Lawrence Alma-Tadema. Christopher Wood has written of Bulleid that ‘Although his 59


GPFA

57 THOMAS MILES RICHARDSON, SENIOR Newcastle 1784-1848 Newcastle

58 HENRY BARLOW CARTER Scarborough 1795-1867 Torquay

Robin Hood’s Bay, Yorkshire

a. The North Porch of Bridlington Priory, Yorkshire

Signed lower left: TR 1836 Watercolour heightened with bodcolour, scratching out and gum arabic 230 x 336 mm., 9 x 13 ¼ in.

Inscribed verso: The North Porch/of Burlington Priory Watercolour over traces of pencil heightened with touches of bodycolour 361 x 258 mm., 14 x 10 in.

Robin Hood’s Bay is five miles south of Whitby on the North Yorkshire coast.

Bridlington Priory, founded in the twelfth century is one of the earliest Augustinian Priories in the country. Having been dissolved by Henry VIII in the 1530s, it was restored in the nineteenth century.

b. A Horse and Cart in a snowy Landscape near St Mary’s Church, Whitby, Yorkshire Signed lower right: H.B. CARTER. 46 Watercolour over traces of pencil 289 x 446 mm., 11 ¼ x 17 ½ in. 60


GPFA

a.

b. 61


GPFA

59 MYLES BIRKET FOSTER, R.W.S. North Shields 1825-1899 Weybridge

60 RAFFAELLE MAINELLA Benevento 1856-1941 Lido di Venezia

View of Saltburn-by-the-Sea, Yorkshire

The Fondamenta Nuova, Venice

Inscribed lower right: Saltburn/by the Sea Watercolour heightened with bodycolour 133 x 243 mm., 5 ¼ x 9 ½ in.

Watercolour, over a pencil underdrawing Signed R. Mainella at the lower left 242 x 185 mm., 9 ½ x 7 ¼ in.

Saltburn-by-the-Sea is 10 miles east of Middleborough on the Yorkshire coast. This is likely to be an on-the-spot sketch by Birket Foster.

The son, grandson and great-grandson of painters, Raffaelle Mainella was trained in Naples before transferring to the Accademia in Venice. Early in his career he worked mainly as a painter in oils, but after a few years decided to devote himself to watercolour, a medium in which he was highly regarded by his contemporaries. Although best known for his watercolour views of the Venice and the Venetian lagoon, Mainella also travelled to Greece, Egypt, Palestine and Syria, and produced a handful of watercolours of Orientalist subjects. He exhibited his work frequently in Venice, notably at the Biennale of 1897, as well in Berlin, Munich and Brussels. In 1901 he was invited by Count Robert de Montesquieu to mount an exhibition of his watercolours in Paris, and was later made an honorary member of the Société des Aquarellistes. 62


SOFA

63


SOFA

64


GPFA

61 GEORGES CLAIRIN Paris 1843-1919 Belle-Îsle-en-Mer

in 1874. Clairin was best known, however, for his paintings of the actress Sarah Bernhardt, whom he depicted in a number of her stage roles as well as in more informal surroundings. This large sheet is a study for Clairin’s painting of Ophelia in the Thistles, for which the model was likely Bernhardt; the painting is today in a private collection.

Study of Thistles Watercolour, heightened with white, over a pencil underdrawing 483 x 300 mm., 19 x 11 ¾ in.

62 JAMES JACKSON CURNOCK Bristol 1839-1891

Provenance Probably the second Clairin studio sale (Lugt 448), Paris, Galerie Georges Petit, 5-6 February 1920

On the river Frome at Stapleton, Bristol

Exhibited Brest, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Brest, Les peintres du rêve en Bretagne, 2006-2007, no.20

Signed lower right: Stapleton/J. Jackson Curnock/1862 Watercolour heightened with bodycolour 360 x 530 mm., 14 x 20 ¾ in.

A graduate of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Georges Clairin first exhibited his work in 1866. Apart from the easel pictures and illustrations for which he was highly regarded, he received a number of public commissions, notably a ceiling painting for the foyer of the Opéra in Paris, painted

This is an early work by the Bristol artist James Jackson Curnock. Stapleton is now a suburb of Bristol to the northeast of the city centre. 65


SOFA

63 PAUL-ALBERT BESNARD Paris 1849-1936 Paris

bold brushwork. These elements also found their way into the artist’s other main activity; his work as a decorative mural painter. He painted large decorative schemes for several public buildings in Paris, as well as for private homes. Although he was strongly influenced by the work of the Impressionists, he never exhibited with them, leading Degas to comment that ‘Besnard is flying with our wings’.

Portrait of a Baby Pastel on brown paper, mounted onto canvas Signed ABesn at the lower right 409 x 327 mm., 16 1/8 x 12 7/8 in.

This spirited pastel sketch can be related to a large painted Portrait of the Artist’s Family of 1890, in the Musée d’Orsay, in which the same baby appears. The baby has been identified as the artist’s youngest child, Jean Besnard (18891958), who was to become a ceramic artist.

Albert Besnard was, by the 1880’s, one of the most highly regarded portrait painters in Paris. He developed a particularly evocative manner of depicting his sitters that relied on luminous, vibrant colours, dramatic lighting and 66


SOFA

64 HENRI EDMOND CROSS Douai 1856-1910 Saint-Clair

Indépendants. Cross did not adopt the Neo-Impressionist techniques of his colleagues Georges Seurat and Paul Signac until the early 1890’s, after Seurat’s death. At around the same time he left Paris for the south of France, eventually settling in the village of Saint-Clair, near Saint-Tropez. The Mediterranean landscape of the Côte d’Azur became his preferred subject matter for the remainder of his career, although he also painted idyllic scenes of bathers and mythological figures. Cross was, however, never very productive as a painter, largely due to a combination of failing eyesight and severe arthritis, and from 1900 onwards painted little.

A Design for a Dish Brush and blue-grey wash, over an underdrawing in pencil Stamped with the atelier stamp H.E.C. (Lugt 1305a) at the lower right Inscribed Ancienne collection Félix Fénéon at the lower left and projet de plat / Henri Edmond Cross. at the lower right 249 x 325 mm., 9 ¾ x 12 ¾ in.

This drawing belonged to the scholar and critic Félix Fénéon (1861-1944), a champion of the Neo-Impressionists, who owned a large number of paintings and watercolours by Cross. In 1907 he organized a retrospective exhibition of Cross’s work at the Galerie Bernheim-Jeune, and following the artist’s death three years later assisted Cross’s widow and Signac with making an inventory of the artist’s studio.

Provenance The studio of the artist, Saint-Clair Félix Fénéon, Paris Little is known of Henri Edmond Cross’s work before 1884, when he first exhibited with the Société des Artistes 67


GPFA

65 HARRY JOHN JOHNSON Birmingham 1826-1884 London

66 THOMAS BAKER OF LEAMINGTON Birmingham 1809-1869

Grange Bridge, Borrowdale, Lake District

The Bridge over the River Avon at Stoneleigh Abbey, Warwickshire

Inscribed lower left: The Entrance to Borrowdale and dated August 1877 Watercolour heightened with scratching out 338 x 502 mm., 13 ¼ x 19 ¾ in.

Watercolour over pencil heightened with touches of bodycolour and scratching out 195 x 137 mm., 7 ½ by 5 ¼ in. Stoneleigh Abbey on the edge of the village of Stoneleigh, Warwickshire, was the home of the Leigh Family from 1561 until the late twentieth century. This bridge across the river Avon was built by John Rennie in 1814. Three oils of Stoneleigh Park views by Baker are in Leamington Art Gallery.

Provenance: The Artist’s studio sale, Christie’s, 5th March 1885, lot 5 Grange Bridge, in the village of Grange, stands at the entrance to Borrowdale between Grange Fell and Castle Crag. It has stood over the River Derwent since 1675. 68


GPFA

69


SOFA

67a HENRI EVENEPOEL Nice 1872-1899 Paris

By descent to their son, Charles De May, Brussels Roland Leten, Ghent Private collection, England

An Artist, thought to be Adolphe Crespin, Painting at an Easel

Literature Philippe Roberts-Jones, ‘Evenepoel et l’art de son temps’, in Eliane De Wilde et al, Henri Evenepoel 1872-1899, exhibition catalogue, Brussels, 1994, illustrated p.92.

Charcoal Stamped with the artist’s monogram he in a circle and numbered No.777 on the verso 384 x 243 mm., 15 1/8 x 9 ½ in.

This caricature is thought to be a portrait of the Belgian painter, decorator and poster designer Adolphe Crespin (1859-1944), who was Henri Evenepoel’s teacher at the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, and was to remain close to the artist throughout his life. Evenepoel painted a portrait of Crespin in 1894.

Provenance Probably the artist’s cousin, Louise De May-van Mattemburgh, Brussels 70


SOFA

67b HENRI EVENEPOEL Nice 1872-1899 Paris

was a great admirer. Describing a visit to Lautrec’s Parisian studio, in a letter to his father in January 1895, Evenepoel wrote that, ‘More than ever, I maintain that Toulouse-Lautrec is an artist of immense value and even that he is a complete artist.’ (Some two years earlier, after another visit to Lautrec’s studio, Evenepoel had noted that, ‘ToulouseLautrec does not much care what anybody thinks of his painting, but he would not forgive any slighting remarks about his American drinks.’)

A Seated Artist, Possibly Toulouse-Lautrec, Drawing at an Easel Charcoal Stamped with the artist’s monogram he in a circle and numbered No.744 on the verso 305 x 212 mm., 12 x 8 3/8 in.

These two caricatures belonged to Evenepoel’s illegitimate son Charles De May, born in 1894 to the artist’s cousin, Louise De May-van Mattemburgh. The drawings may be compared stylistically with several sketches of figures formerly in the collection of Roland Leten in Ghent, who is likely to have also owned the present pair.

Provenance See No. 67a. The present sheet may be a caricature portrait of Henri de Toulouse-Lautec (1864-1901), of whose work Evenepoel 71


GPFA

68 ALFRED WILLIAM HUNT Liverpool 1830-1896 London

picture dealer James Wyatt who had a shop on the High Street. Wyatt commissioned Hunt to go on a series of sketching trips to North Wales which he funded in exchange for the option to sell the finished works in his shop.

View of Capel Curig with Snowdon and the Glyders beyond, North Wales

The present drawing, an early work, originates from such a trip and dates from the year of his first picture exhibited at the Royal Academy, in 1856, ‘The Stream from Lyn Idwal’. John Ruskin who had published his Modern Painters IV in April 1856, described it as ‘the best landscape I have seen in the [Academy] exhibition for many a day – uniting most subtle finish and watchfulness of Nature, with real and rare power of composition’ (The Works of John Ruskin, ed. Cook & Wedderburn, 1903-12, vol. XIV, pp.50-51).

Signed lower centre: AWHunt/1856 Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour and gum arabic Sheet 248 x 344mm., 9 ¾ by 13 ½ in. Born in Liverpool, the son of a drawing master, Hunt read Classics at Corpus Christi, Oxford, on a scholarship. While a student, he was encouraged to draw by the Oxford 72


GPFA

69 ALFRED WILLIAM HUNT Liverpool 1830-1896 London

This dates from Hunt’s first trip to Scotland in 1868. Christopher Newall quotes a letter Hunt wrote to William Greenwell in February 1860: ‘Where are you inclined to go this summer? What do you say to Glen Nevis & Skye. For purely artistic reasons I should prefer Scotland to Wales’ (see Christopher Newall, The Poetry of Truth – Alfred William Hunt and the Art of Landscape, Exhibition Catalogue, Ashmolean Museum, 2004, p. 128). It was not until 1868 however when Hunt was invited by a friend to sail off the west coast of Scotland that he made it. For a view of Loch Torridon, a large sea loch adjacent to Skye, see Newall, op. cit., no. 39, p. 128. Lochalsh is a sea loch standing between the north-east corner of Skye and the mainland of Scotland.

Loch Alsh, Isle of Skye Signed lower right: A.W. Hunt/1868 and inscribed lower left: Loch Alsh Watercolour over pencil 249 x 365 mm., 9 ¾ x 14 ¼ in. Provenance: P.W. Mitchell, Newcastle; Miss E.M. Jones, Chilbolton Exhibited: London, Society of Painters in Water-colours, Winter Exhibition 1873-74, no. 330; London, Burlington Fine Art Club, 1887, no. 10 73


GPFA

70 WALLER HUGH PATON, R.S.A., R.S.W. Dunfermline 1828-1895 Edinburgh

sketch. There is a tradition on Arran that ‘Paton’s numerous landscapes so contributed to the popularity of the island for holiday makers, that he was allowed free lodging at the main hotel in Brodick’ (see June Baxter, Waller Hugh Paton: a Scottish Landscape Painter, 1992). Ruskin and Millais were both friends of his brother Noel and he has been described as the leading exponent of the Pre-Raphaelite landscape in Scotland. Paton exhibited views of Arran at the Royal Scottish Academy from 1854.

A Wooded Stream, Arran Signed lower left: Arran/19.th Sept. 1855/W.H. Paton Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour on brown paper 270 x 381mm., 10 ½ x 15 in.

Provenance: J.S. Maas & Co., London; Bought by Sir David Scott (1887-1986), January 1974 for £130; By family descent until 2008

Paton was born in Dunfermline, the son of a damask designer, for whom he worked as an assistant before becoming a pupil of J.A. Houston. As a young man, his family, including his brother the artist Sir Joseph Noel Paton, often spent summer holidays on Arran, where they would 74


GPFA

71 GEORGE PRICE BOYCE London 1826 -1897 London

into the Pre-Raphaelite circle. His diaries which he kept between 1851 and 1875 provide a fascinating insight into their activities.

View on the River Teme, Ludlow, Shropshire

He exhibited a number of Ludlow views in the early 1870s (see Christopher Newall and Judy Egerton, George Price Boyce, 1987, p. 60, nos. 53 and 54). This is likely to be one of the two views on the river Neme which he exhibited at the Society of Painters in Water-colours in 1873 and most probably ‘The Teme at Ludlow, September.’ A smaller sketch of this view, inscribed and dated October 1872, was sold at Christie's South Kensington on 22nd February 2011, lot 276.

Signed lower right: G.P. BOYCE. 72-3 Watercolour over traces of pencil 287 x 420 mm., 11 ¼ x 16 ½ in. Boyce was studying to be an architect until he met David Cox (see nos. 33 and 34) at Bettws-y-Coed in August 1849, which inspired him to be a landscape artist. In the early 1850s, he met Rossetti and was accepted 75


SOFA

72 WILLIAM FRASER GARDEN Gillingham 1856-1921 Huntingdon

Huntingdonshire. He was very poor for most of his life, and was declared bankrupt in 1899. Garden’s body of work has only recently been rediscovered, and his reputation as among the finest Victorian landscape watercolourists is now firmly established.

The Bridge at St. Ives, Huntingdonshire Watercolour Signed with initials and dated W. F. G. ’99. at the lower right 120 x 155 mm., 4 ¾ x 6 1/8 in.

Christopher Newall has aptly described Garden’s watercolour views of his native Huntingdonshire and along the river Ouse in Bedfordshire as ‘extraordinary in their pellucid clarity of light and their exact delineation of architectural and landscape detail.’ Garden painted several views of the narrow stone bridge, built around 1415, in the town of St. Ives, on the left bank of the river Ouse. The chapel dedicated to St. Leger, constructed on the eastern side of the bridge, with an altar consecrated in 1426, is one of only three surviving examples of bridge chapels in England. This watercolour depicts the upper two-story extension to the chapel which was added in 1736, when the structure was converted to a house. The bridge chapel was returned to its original appearance in 1930.

Born into a family of artists, William Fraser Garden exhibited his watercolours at the Royal Academy, the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Institute of Painters in WaterColours. The subjects of his watercolours were mainly views of the fen villages along the river Ouse, such as Holywell, Hemingford Grey and St. Ives, and are characterized by a remarkable attention to detail and crisp, cool lighting. Never a very prolific artist, Garden seems to have given up exhibiting in London by 1890, and from then on relied on a small number of local collectors in 76


SOFA

73 FREDERICK CAYLEY ROBINSON, A.R.A. Brentford-on-Thames 1862-1927 London

Drawn in 1908 and exhibited the same year, this drawing by Frederick Cayley Robinson was illustrated shortly thereafter in the magazine The Studio, in which it was noted of the artist that ‘Even in his more everyday subjects…the significance of the picture seems not to lie in the scene, but the feeling that the fates themselves are concealed – that something is portending. The figures seem to be standing at the margin of an imaginary world, without passing into it, and a knowledge of destiny is seen in their eyes. In the picture The Two Sisters all the figures look as if they felt that they were watched by some invisible watcher.’

The Two Sisters Pencil and coloured chalks on buff paper Signed CAYLEY ROBINSON at the lower left and signed and dated CAYLEY / ROBINSON . 1908 at the lower right 156 x 246 mm., 6 1/8 x 9 5/8 in.

With some differences, the poses and arrangement of the three figures in this drawing was to be repeated as part of two larger, finished compositions by Cayley Robinson; a tempera painting entitled Reminescence, dated 1908, in the Leamington Spa Art Gallery and Museum, and a gouache drawing entitled The Renunciants, dated 1916, in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Provenance Carfax & Co. Ltd., London, in 1908 Samuel John Lamorna Birch, Lamorna, Cornwall Thence by descent until 1998 Private collection, Spain Literature T. Martin Wood, ‘Some Recent Work by Mr. Cayley Robinson’, The Studio, April 1910, pp.204-205, illustrated 77


SOFA

74 UBALDO COSIMO VENEZIANI Bologna 1894-1958 Milan

and poster designer in the 1930’s and 1940’s, Veneziani eventually gave up a career in the advertising business to devote himself solely to art and design. Among his designs for book covers are several for the publishing house Edizioni Alpes in the 1920’s, such as Alberto Moravia’s Gli Indiffirenti, published in 1929. Veneziani also designed the covers for the first Italian editions of Théophile Gautier’s Ménagerie intime, published in Rome in 1928, and G. K. Chesterton’s The Napoleon of Notting Hill, which appeared in Milan a year later.

La Morsa Pen and black ink Signed VENE / ZIANI at the lower right Faintly inscribed LA MORSA at the upper right Further inscribed base cm 17 / scontornato at the upper right 246 x 334 mm., 9 ¾ x 13 1/8 in.

The present sheet is a drawing for the title page or frontispiece of a printing of the play La Morsa (The Vise) by Luigi Pirandello. Written in 1892 and first published in 1898 under the title L’epilogo in the cultural journal Ariel, La Morsa was not performed on stage until December 1910, at the Teatro Metastasio in Rome.

After completing his studies at the Accademia di Brera in Milan, Ubaldo Veneziani became known as a fashion illustrator, and his drawings appeared in several women’s fashion magazines. Active as a gifted painter, book illustrator 78


GPFA

75 THOMAS COLLIER Glossop 1840-1891 Hampstead Black Rock Sands Beach, Morfa Bychan, North Wales Signed lower left: T. Collier Watercolour over pencil 172 x 248 mm., 6 他 x 9 他 in. This is an early work by Collier probably drawn when he was living in Bettws-y-Coed between 1864 and 1869. He is is the best known follower of David Cox and specialised in moorland scenes. Morfa Bychan is a small village with a long two mile beach known as Black Rock Sands. It is just west of Porthmadog on the south coast of the Lleyn peninsula. 79


SOFA

76 HENRI LE SIDANER Port-Louis (Mauritius) 1862-1939 Versailles

kilometres north of Paris, where he eventually settled. He worked there until the end of his life, painting numerous scenes of his cottage and its extensive gardens. In 1930 he was admitted into the Académie, a triumph for a painter who chose to work outside official circles for most of his career. Le Sidaner delighted in capturing transient effects of light, and would paint scenes in bright sunlight, at twilight or in moonlight. While he often made sketches and drawings sur le motif, his paintings were generally done from memory rather than direct observation.

A Fountain in a Village Square Black chalk, on white paper A study of houses around a square in pencil, with touches of yellow, green and red chalk, on the verso Signed Le Sidaner at the lower right 194 x 247 mm., 7 5/8 x 9 ¾ in.

Le Sidaner achieved remarkable effects of solitude and serenity in his pictures, and chose his compositions carefully to heighten the poetic mood. As one contemporary critic wrote, ‘corners of small towns in winter, glum suburbs, a farm with pallid windows, streets with echelons of feeble, pensive lights form a decor which gives the best possible expression to Le Sidaner’s exquisite sensitivity.’ The artist’s landscapes and town scenes are almost always devoid of figures. The painter Paul Signac noted of him that ‘his entire work is influenced by a taste for tender, soft and silent atmospheres. Gradually, he even went so far as to eliminate from his paintings all human figures, as if he feared that the slightest human form might disturb their ruffled silence.’

Literature Yann Farinaux-Le Sidaner, Le Sidaner: L’oeuvre peint et gravé, Paris, 1989, p.336, no.1019 (where dated c.1912) Exhibited Paris, Musée Galliera, Rétrospective Henri Le Sidaner, April 1948 Henri Le Sidaner received relatively little academic training, and only had his first one-man gallery show in 1897. Around 1901 he visited the village of Gerberoy, about a hundred 80


SOFA

77 ALBERT HUYOT Paris 1872-1968 Paris

were done in a generic Post-Impressionist manner, but he soon became influenced by Cubism. He exhibited regularly at the Salon des Indépendants, the Salon d’Automne and the Salon des Tuileries. He also participated in the Grande Exposition in Brussels in 1910, and the same year spent some time in Russia. Huyot was a friend of Henri Matisse, and around 1912 his work reveals the influence of Fauvism; André Derain was another particular influence. After 1920, however, Huyot seems to have abandoned the rigour of his earlier work in favour of landscape painting.

A Collage on the Theme of the First World War Black chalk, pencil, oil and mixed media collage, on grey paper from a large sketchbook Signed, dated and inscribed A. Huyot 1917 / Souvenir de Poperinghe at the lower centre 340 x 488 mm., 13 3/8 x 19 ¼ in.

The Belgian town of Poperinghe was the main military centre for Allied forces in Flanders during the First World War, and was surrounded by camps, headquarters, hospitals and supply depots. A few kilometers west of Ypres, Poperinghe was frequently the recipient of heavy German artillery bombardment but remained in Allied hands for most of the war. A military cemetery remains in the town today.

Provenance Possibly the posthumous Huyot studio sale, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 19 April 1982, as part of lot 24 (‘env. 54 dessins “Croquis de Guerre 1914-1918” (Alsace, Lorraine, Vosges)’ The son and grandson of artists, Albert Huyot was a pupil of Diogène Maillart and Gustave Moreau. His first paintings 81


GPFA

78 JOHN WILLIAM INCHBOLD Leeds 1830-1888 Headingley View at Innsbruck, Austria Inscribed lower right: Innsbruck Watercolour over pencil 178 x 265 mm., 7 x 10 Âź in. Inchbold first visited the Alps in 1856 in the company of John Ruskin, who was an early champion of his work. He returned in 1857 and 1858 when he again met up with Ruskin at Fluelen. He settled in Switzerland in 1879 and spent the last years of his life on the north shores of Lake Geneva. This is clearly an on-the-spot sketch originating from a sketchbook. 82


SOFA

79 WILLIAM SUHR Kreutzburg 1896-1984 Mt. Kisco

where he soon took up the practice of painting conservation and restoration. Within a few years Suhr had established a thriving practice as a paintings conservator in Berlin, working on pictures in the collection of the Kaiser Friedrich Museum in the 1920’s. In 1927 he left Germany to work at the Detroit Institute of Arts, and in 1935 transferred to the Frick Collection in New York, where he worked for over forty years until his retirement in 1977. Suhr also worked for numerous private and institutional clients, including museums in Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, New York, San Francisco, Toledo and elsewhere. He conserved many of the most significant Old Master paintings in American collections, and was particularly noted for his work on Rembrandt paintings.

Portrait of Gertrude Schulman Black chalk, with touches of red chalk, red and green watercolour, and white heightening on buff paper, laid down on card Signed SUHR at the upper right and dated 1917 at the lower right 273 x 230 mm., 10 ¾ x 9 in. Provenance Given by the artist’s wife, Henriette Granville Suhr, to a private collector

The present sheet dates from the period of William Suhr’s studies at the Akademie in Berlin. He had begun painting and drawing as a youth, and continued to draw throughout his life, working mainly in watercolour.

One of the leading painting conservators working in America in the 20th century, William Suhr was born in Germany and trained as a painter at the Akademie in Berlin, 83


SOFA

80a ANNIE FRENCH Glasgow 1872-1965 Jersey

watercolour on vellum. Her work was often on a small scale and was drawn in an elaborate Art Nouveau style that displays the particular influence of the work of Aubrey Beardsley. French’s work was first exhibited in 1903, while she was still a student, at the Salon in Brussels, and in later years she exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy and the Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts, where she showed until 1924. In 1909 French succeeded Jessie M. King in the Department of Design at the Glasgow School of Art, teaching ceramic decoration. Both French and King had a penchant for line drawings and romantic subject matter, but whereas King’s output became more varied, French remained devoted to this particular mode of expression throughout her career.

Flowers Pen and brown ink on a thin card, laid down on a paper mount decorated with a border of petals, leaves and (on the reverse) flowers in pen and ink Signed Annie French at the upper right Inscribed With / Our loving / Greetings to / Dear Bobbie & Agnes in the lower centre and Notes in the centre of the lower margin 270 x 208 mm., 10 5/8 x 8 1/8 in. [with mount]

This and the following three drawings are examples of greeting cards that Annie French produced for friends and family members. Such glimpses into the artist’s private correspondence are rare; she is known to have produced many postcards but only a few such works survive, including one example in the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Encouraged in her artistic ambitions by her parents, Annie French was trained at the Glasgow School of Art under F. H. (‘Fra’) Newbery and the Belgian Symbolist painter Jean Delville, and was active as an illustrator in the first quarter of the 20th Century. She produced book illustrations, designs for greeting cards – for which she was perhaps best known in her lifetime – and independent compositions in 84


SOFA

80b ANNIE FRENCH Glasgow 1872-1965 Jersey

Inscribed With loving wishes for the New Year. 1924. at the bottom and with the artist’s address Eaglesmere. 25 Trinity Rise Tulse Hill London. S.W.2. in the lower margin 179 x 122 mm., 7 x 4 ¾ in. [image]

A Girl with a Blue Coat: New Year’s Greeting Card, 1924 Pen and brown ink and watercolour, on a folded card with a pale blue ribbon 85


SOFA

80c ANNIE FRENCH Glasgow 1872-1965 Jersey

composition and a delicacy of handling. As one modern scholar has noted, ‘Her backgrounds are extremely detailed, full of flowers, green swards, plants, trees. Mechanisms and industry do not appear. There is considerable variation in tone, which is achieved by fine and finer pen lines, dots and dotted lines, hatching. The darkest patches are usually complex hatching, not plain solid black. It is a style requiring time, patience, and considerable invention. Where colour is used it is generally applied decoratively, with an eye to pattern. The work is a line drawing with colour, not a watercolour with lines, although sometimes lines are used over the colour again.’

A Bunch of Flowers: New Year’s Greeting Card, 1927 Pen and brown ink, on a paper mount decorated with a border of petals in pen and ink Signed and dated Annie French / 27 Dec. 1927 at the right centre and inscribed A Merry / New Year / to Bobbie / & Agnes. at the lower right 288 x 227 mm., 11 3/8 x 9 in.

The dedication on this drawing may refer to one of the artist’s sisters, Agnes.

The drawings of Annie French are usually quite small in scale, and are characterized by both an intricacy of 86


SOFA

80d ANNIE FRENCH Glasgow 1872-1965 Jersey

1905: ‘It will be noticed in these drawings that, in place of the strength and the variety of the Beardsley line, in exchange for the expressiveness with which genius informed it, we have an exquisite pattern woven from a fanciful usage of the dots and lines his method suggested. The drawings are much more to Miss French’s credit than any imitation of the qualities of the Beardsley line; as it is, they are not an imitation, but a device, charming, original, and dainty. One motif from Beardsley’s work has been retained, rearranged, and used for the sake of itself, combined with many qualities that entirely are Miss French’s own.’ Drawings by Annie French are today in the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle and the Glasgow Museums and Art Galleries at Kelvingrove, which houses a small album of her drawings.

A Woman and Child in a Landscape Pen and brown ink and watercolour on a thin card, laid down on a paper mount decorated with a border of leaves and flowers in pen and ink Signed Annie French. at the lower left 114 x 90 mm., 4 ½ x 3 ½ in. [image] 208 x 181 mm., 8 1/8 x 7 1/8 in. [sheet] The influence of Aubrey Beardsley on the draughtsmanship of the young Annie French was already noted in an early appraisal of her work, published in The Studio magazine in 87


SOFA

81 TSUGUHARU FOUJITA Tokyo 1886-1968 Zurich

decided to settle in Paris, where he arrived in 1913. He soon made his mark in the artistic milieu of bohemian Paris, becoming friendly with such artists as Picasso, Matisse, Modigliani, Soutine and Gris. Although he was associated with the artists of the School of Paris, and in 1920 became a permanent member of the Salon d’Automne, Foujita created his own individual style, characterized by a combination of Japanese, French and European influences.

Portrait of a Young Woman Pencil, with stumping, on light brown paper Signed Foujita and in Japanese at the lower left centre 280 x 262 mm., 11 x 10 3/8 in.

Datable on stylistic grounds to the second half of the 1920’s, this is a preparatory study for a small oil painting by Foujita, of similar dimensions, in a private collection in San Francisco. The drawing also served to prepare a lithograph, in the same direction as the present sheet.

A painter, draughtsman and printmaker, Tsuguharu Foujita studied in his native Tokyo but, disappointed by the conservative nature of the training he received there, 88


SOFA

82 GERALD SPINK Active between 1920 and 1940

An accomplished artist and illustrator, Gerald Spink also worked an aeronautical engineer for Hawker Engineering in Kingston-on-Thames. He designed artwork for a number of travel and advertising posters, for such clients as Southern Railways, the London and North Eastern Railway and MG cars, as well as Shell, Castrol, the British Steel Corporation and Hawker Engineering. In 1933 Spink won a prize for his artwork exhibited at the Competition of Industrial Designs at the Imperial Institute. Shortly after the Second World War, Spink also designed and built a 500cc racing car, nicknamed the ‘Squanderbug’, a project he completed in 1947.

Southern Electric Gouache on paper Signed G. MACK SPINK at the lower left 710 x 520 mm., 28 x 20 ½ in.

89


GPFA

90


SOFA

83 ALFRED CHARLES CONRADE Leeds 1863-1955 Heywood

84 Circle of JOAQUÍN SOROLLA Y BASTIDA Valencia 1863-1923 Madrid

The Scuola Grande San Giovanni Evangelista, Venice

Beaching the Boat

Signed on pediment lower right: AC CONRADE Watercolour over pencil heightened with bodycolour 556 x 387 mm., 21 ¾ x 15 ¼ in.

Watercolour, over a pencil underdrawing 217 x 308 mm., 8 ½ x 12 1/8 in.

This shows one of the five ‘Scuole Grande’ or confraternities of Venice, located in the San Polo area of Venice. Originally founded in 1261, the marble screen was added by Pietro Lombardo in 1478-81and incorporates the eagle of St. John. Conrade studied at the Dusseldorf Academy as well as in Paris and Madrid. He established a reputation as an architectural painter – his extensive use of pencil underdrawing is typical – and travelled widely in Europe and Japan. He was chief architect at White City from 1911 to 1914, the site of the enormous Franco-British exhibition of 1908 and the London Olympic Games of the same year. 91


SOFA

85 GEORGE BARBIER Nantes 1882-1982 Paris

Among the leading illustrators of the Art Deco movement, George Barbier first came to public attention with an exhibition of his drawings in Paris in 1911. Characterized by a refinement and elegance which epitomized the Art Deco era, much of Barbier’s work took the form of fashion illustrations for such magazines as La Gazette du Bon Ton, Fémina, Costumes parisiens, Vogue and the Journal des dames et des modes. He provided fashion plates for some of the leading couturiers of the period, notably Paul Poiret, Jeanne Lanvin and Madeleine Vionnet. He also produced designs for stage sets and theatre costumes, as well as fabrics, fans and wallpaper. Drawn in 1925, this is a costume design for a theatrical production. As the critic Edmond Jaloux noted of such drawings, ‘When I look at Barbier’s costumes for the stage, I see the characters of those magical stories come to life before me and tempt my imagination.’

La tasse de thé: Séraphine en rose et noir Pen and black ink and grey wash and watercolour, over a pencil underdrawing Signed and dated GEORGE / BARBIER / 1925 at the right centre Variously inscribed and titled cg 1029 / Juliette / Séraphine / ref. / Taille / “La tasse de thé / Séraphine en rose et noir” on the verso 263 x 204 mm., 10 3/8 x 8 in.

92


SOFA

86 PAUL-ÉMILE PISSARRO Eragny 1884-1972 Clécy

By the 1920’s he was sharing a studio with Kees van Dongen in Paris, and exhibiting at the Salon des Indépendants, the Salon des Tuileries and the Salon d’Automne.

Study of Willow Trees

As noted by the artist on the verso. this watercolour was drawn in 1926 at Lyons-la-Fôret in Upper Normandy, where Paul-Émile Pissarro had settled two years previously. The drawing displays the particular influence of Paul Cézanne on the young Pissarro, who would have met Cézanne several times in Paris, and who would have also known the master’s work from the paintings which hung in the Pissarro home in Eragny. Cézanne’s influence on PaulÉmile is evident in the overall tonality of many of his paintings and watercolours, as well as his preference for a palette knife over a paintbrush in later years.

Watercolour, over a pencil underdrawing Signed and dated Paulémile Pissarro. 1926. at the lower left Inscribed Saules à Lyons on the verso. 482 x 320 mm., 19 x 12 5/8 in. The fifth and youngest child of Camille Pissarro, Paul-Émile (or Paulémile, as he preferred to sign his work) Pissarro was nineteen years old when his father died in 1903. As a young boy he had accompanied his father on painting trips, and also took painting lessons with his godfather, Claude Monet. 93


SOFA

94


SOFA

87 LÉON BENIGNI 1892-1948

Signed BRUNELLESCHI at the lower right 250 x 324 mm., 9 7/8 x 12 ¾ in. Literature Cristina Nuzzi, Umberto Brunelleschi: fashion-stylist, illustrator, stage and costume designer, 1979, p.20

Design for the Cover of La Donna magazine Gouache, over a pencil underdrawing, on paper laid down on board Signed and dated lbénigni / 1929 at the lower left Inscribed La Donna on the backing board 350 x 264 mm. (13 ¾ x 10 3/8 in.) [sheet]

Italian by birth, Umberto Brunelleschi lived and worked in France for almost his entire career. Admired in particular for his fashion illustrations, he is also regarded as one of the finest book illustrators of the Art Deco period. Between the two World Wars, Brunelleschi worked mainly for the stage, designing costumes and sets for the Folies-Bergère, the Théâtre du Châtelet and the Casino de Paris between 1919 and 1939. He created costume designs for the American star Josephine Baker, and also provided stage designs for La Scala in Milan and the Roxy Theater in New York. Datable to c.1935, this stage design has been tentatively related to The Girls in Uniform, a Bluebell Girls revue of that year.

88 UMBERTO BRUNELLESCHI Montemurlo 1879-1949 Paris Design for a Stage Set: America Gouache and watercolour on paper laid down on card 95


SOFA

89 SAMUEL JOHN ‘LAMORNA’ BIRCH, R.A., R.W.S. Egremont 1869-1955 Lamorna

friend Greta Sequeira, an amateur painter Birch met in 1937, when she was aged twenty-eight and staying at a holiday cottage in Cornwall with her parents. They soon became friends and spent much time together, often travelling to London to visit exhibitions and artist’s studios. The close friendship between Greta and Birch, despite the significant age difference between them, seems to have led to occasional gossip about the nature of their relationship. At the time he made this small drawing for her, Birch seems to have been somewhat infatuated with the young woman, writing poems to her and taking great pleasure in her constant company. Yet, as the artist’s biographer has noted, ‘The attractions of Greta Sequiera for Birch went beyond her good looks. He was stimulated by her enthusiasm for painting and travel. Her energy, he told her, was like oxygen, giving him the drive to pursue his painting with unflagging vigour…Birch’s friendship with Greta continued to be a rather odd mixture of serious endeavour and high-spirited excitement, cemented by a shared enjoyment of the earthiness of life.’ Although in 1941 Greta married the artist’s patron, the publisher Ranald Valentine, she remained close to BIrch throughout his life, and corresponded with him until his death.

A Flower of November Pen and brown ink and watercolour Inscribed A flower of November, and signed, dated and dedicated To Greta from John. / S.J Lamorna Birch 1939 at the bottom 111 x 89 mm., 4 3/8 x 3½ in. Provenance Given by the artist to Greta Sequeira Valentine in 1939. S. J. ‘Lamorna’ Birch was a superb watercolourist, and worked in the medium to the end of his life. In a review of a 1911 exhibition of his watercolours, one critic wrote that ‘This artist is becoming one of our best watercolourists with a quite personal method and habit of looking at things.’ This small, charming sketch is dedicated to the artist’s longtime 96


SOFA

90 SIR FRANK BRANGWYN, R.A. Bruges 1867-1956 Ditchling

an exhibition of Brangwyn’s watercolours in 1934, a critic noted of him that ‘He is English, perhaps in the skill with which he handles water-colours, but he is far from being readily related to the so-called English Tradition. He is not as realistic as Constable, nor as romantic as Turner, nor as “flat” as Cotman, nor as atmospheric as Cox, nor as architectural as Roberts, nor as delicate as Steer. He is one thing that none of these watercolourists ever were: primarily decorative…every water-colour here strikes the spectator at a distance.’ Another scholar has noted of Brangwyn that ‘The variety and excellence of his water-colours gives them the right to be considered entirely upon their own high merits, as great works of art carried out in a medium which is more difficult, more exacting, more spontaneous and more revealing than any other.’

A Hilltop Castle at Sunset Watercolour over a pencil underdrawing; the sheet folded over at the bottom A sketch of a tree in black chalk on the verso Signed FB at the lower right, and again on the overlap and inscribed white(?) stalks and laib coll on the overlap 171 x 358 mm., 6 ¾ x 14 1/8 in. [image] 219 x 359 mm., 8 5/8 x 14 1/8 in. [sheet]

This vibrant watercolour sketch belonged to William de Belleroche (1913-1969), a longtime friend of the artist, who owned a large number of works by Brangwyn, including more than eighty watercolours, and promoted his work tirelessly. He organized several exhibitions of the artist’s work, notably the retrospective exhibition held at the Royal Academy in 1952; the first to be devoted to a living artist. As Sir Gerald Kelly, the President of the Royal Academy, referred to him in a letter of that year, ‘Count de Belleroche, whose love of Brangwyn passes many men’s understanding.’

Provenance Count William de Belleroche, Brighton Frank Brangwyn’s numerous watercolours were mainly devoted to landscapes and townscapes, and were generally more subdued in tonality than his oil paintings and murals, and less dominated by figures. Many of his watercolours are actually works of mixed media, enlivened with the addition of touches of gouache, tempera, pencil, chalk, pastel or pen and ink, and are often very large in scale. In a brief review of 97


SOFA

91 HUMPHREY JENNINGS Walberswick 1907-1950 Poros

characterized by a spare, almost Oriental, use of line. As his friend Kathleen Raine recalled, ‘Sometimes he would paint some apparently naively simple, realistic object…only a few brushmarks, of infinite delicacy of touch and subtlety of colour, on canvases largely left bare – so left because every brushmark must be made with meaning, deliberately placed according to a complex imaginative operation, involving both conscious thought and instinctive sensibility…French in visual perception, English in his sense of the poetic image, Chinese in his philosophy of how an action (painting in particular) should be performed, he sought simultaneously for three kinds of truth; in his mature work, so it seems to me, all these are achieved.’

The Purple Yacht Pencil, black chalk and watercolour on oatmeal paper Stamped with the Jennings studio stamp on the verso 314 x 240 mm., 12 3/8 x 9 ½ in. Best known as one of the leading documentary filmmakers of the 1930’s and 1940’s, Humphrey Jennings was also a painter, draughtsman, photographer and poet. Indeed, as a friend noted of him, ‘He always regarded himself as, before everything, a painter; film-making was of secondary importance.’ Both his paintings and drawings are

Relatively few paintings and drawings by Jennings are signed, dated or titled, and only a handful of his works are today in public collections, including the Tate. This watercolour may be dated to 1949, and is a study for a small oil painting, of identical dimensions and dated 1949-50. 98


GPFA

92 JOHN NORTHCOTE NASH, R.A. Kensington 1893-1977 Colchester Combining Variously inscribed with colour and other notes Washes and biro over pencil on laid paper 227 x 309 mm., 9 x 12 in. Provenance: The Artist’s Estate The use of biro suggests this drawing dates from the 1960s. 99


SOFA

93 DEWITT HARDY Born 1940

1973, and his watercolours are represented in several American museums, as well as in the British Museum and the Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery of Modern Art in Dublin. At the time of an exhibition of Hardy’s work in a New York gallery in 1981, the art critic John Russell noted that, ‘There is something peculiar about the watercolors of DeWitt Hardy. In many respects they could have been done 50 and even 100 years ago. Slipped into a survey of the English 19th century watercolor school, many of them would not look at all out of place. If there is something specifically American about them, it may be the austerity with which the color is laid on the paper, as if water were about to be rationed among watercolorists.’

Oranges Watercolour on paper, laid down Signed D. Hardy at the upper right 267 x 330 mm., 10 ½ x 13 in. Born in Missouri, the watercolour artist DeWitt Hardy lives and works in Maine. He has been exhibiting his work since 100


SOFA

94 ANNE NEWLAND Warminster 1913-1997 London(?)

The following year she was awarded a full scholarship, which allowed her a further two years in the city. Newland was particularly influenced by the work of Italian Renaissance artists, especially Andrea Mantegna. Her chief work while in Rome was a cartoon for a large mural of The Legend of Ceres. Intended as the central panel of a triptych, the painting was never brought to fruition when the outbreak of the Second World War interrupted her studies in Italy. This fine drawing is a study for the drapery of a woman standing by a well in a later version of The Legend of Ceres, painted by Newland in the late 1940’s.

Drapery Study Pencil and watercolour. 374 x 276 mm., 14 ž x 10 7/8 in. Anne Newland studied at the Byam Shaw School of Art in London, between 1936 and 1938, when she won an Abbey Scholarship to study at the British School in Rome. 101


SOFA

95 FLEUR COWLES New York 1908-2009 Sussex

of them as a child at zoos, but my husband has a different answer and I agree that he’s partially right. He once gave me an Abyssinian cat…the sleek animal stayed long enough for me to absorb him and his ways in my mind’s eye. He used our home as a jungle, prowling (never strolling) through and round the furniture, and never in a straight line. He would fly to the top of a high armoire in our bedroom, to stare down at me intently. Sometimes he would jump into my office wastebasket to continue to stare, a friendly beast but no house cat, he. I obviously did mentally photograph his jumps, his walk and his eyes.’

River Rendezvous Oil on board Signed and dated FLEUR 75 at the lower right Titled River / Rendez / vous on a piece of paper pasted on the reverse. 278 x 717 mm., 10 7/8 x 28 ¼ in.

Of her working method, Fleur Cowles has written that, ‘There are probably few painters (other than the Chinese who paint their scrolls on a flat surface) who use no easel, use no palette and have no studio. The absence of all three describes in a very few words how I paint. My lap replaces the easel; the tubes of paint are in themselves my palette (I paint directly from them); my library couch in Sussex is my studio. I paint with either tubes or jars of acrylic paint gathered up by my brush as a bow would the strings of a violin…I never think about or compose a painting in advance (in my mind or on paper). I never draw. I never use a model or copy a thing. I paint what has been packed away in my computer-memory, those animals, flowers and scenes which wait for my brush to give them life.’

The artist, socialite, writer and editor Fleur Cowles lived a long and fascinating life in New York and London, and was perhaps best known as a magazine editor and publisher. She began to paint seriously in the late 1950’s, producing richly colourful works that combine wild animals, birds and flowers in a kind of romantic dream world. The first of over sixty solo exhibitions of her paintings took place in London in 1959. As the artist noted, ‘My paintings seem to make people happy, They represent my private world, a peaceful one that rejects the unpleasant, the ugly and the frightening, and dredges up no horrible dreams.’ Leopards and tigers appear in many of Cowles’ paintings: ‘I am continually asked why I paint these jungle beasts. I don’t think there is anything more to it than a vivid memory I have 102


SOFA

96 RENÉ GRUAU Covignano 1909-2004 Rome

Arguably the finest fashion illustrator of the 20th century, René Gruau produced numerous designs for the covers of fashion magazines, notably Vogue, International Textiles, Club, Sir, Elle and L’Officiel de la Couture et de la Mode de Paris. The present sheet is a design for the cover of the August 1985 issue of the trade magazine International Textiles. This was, in fact, among the very last covers for the magazine to be designed by Gruau, who had produced bold, vibrant cover drawings for almost every issue of the monthly periodical since 1946.

Woman in a White Dress: Design for the Cover of International Textiles Magazine, August 1985 Gouache, watercolour, brush and black ink on paper laid down on board Signed with the initial *G at the lower right 355 x 265 mm. (14 x 10 3/8 in.) [sheet] 103


SOFA

97 HUGH BUCHANAN Born 1958

evoked. You feel yourself inside, not merely particular spaces, but in those spaces as first conceived by the great architects who designed them.’

Dusty Sunlight at Syon House

Buchanan’s watercolours are characterized by a strong sense of atmosphere, allied to an abiding interest in the forms of classical domestic architecture as seen in diffused light. The present sheet depicts a view of the interior of Syon House in west London, the residence of the Dukes of Northumberland, designed by Robert Adam in the 1760’s. As noted in a catalogue of Buchanan’s watercolours, ‘At Syon House the interiors created by Robert Adam for the first Duke of Northumberland have a superlative finish which tests all Buchanan’s most developed skills in his chosen medium. He evidently reveled here in extravagant detail such as the ivory inlay on doorframes, indulging his passion for the fall of light on rich fabric, exploring areas where different textures meet, sometimes resulting in almost abstract patterns. Oak floorboards are set against intricate mouldings framing tattered stretches of brocade damask wallpaper and flaking gold leaf, illuminated by a hesitant, milky sunlight.’

Pencil and watercolour Signed and dated Buchanan 2004 at the lower right 287 x 380 mm., 11 ¼ x 15 in. Hugh Buchanan studied at the Edinburgh College of Art, from which he graduated in 1980. He has made a particular specialty of watercolour views of the interiors of stately homes and historic buildings in England, Scotland, France and throughout Europe. Buchanan has received commissions from the National Trust, the Houses of Parliament and the Prince of Wales, for whom he painted views of the interiors of Balmoral in 1987 and Highgrove House in 1994. As A. N. Wilson has written of the artist, ‘Hugh Buchanan’s paintings do not merely depict, they inhabit an architecture. You feel yourself in these rooms and houses which he has, over thirty years, so incomparably 104


SOFA

98 BERNDT DAMS AND ANDREW ZEGA Born 1964 and Born 1961

Tent and a Philosopher’s Pavilion, all since destroyed – were laid out by Bélanger in collaboration with the Scottish gardener Thomas Blaikie. Bagatelle survived the Revolution largely intact, and in 1835 was purchased by Lord Hertford to house his collection, today the nucleus of the Wallace Collection in London. Now owned by the city of Paris, the château remains in the park today, albeit considerably altered, and this watercolour drawing records its original appearance.

The Entrance Facade of the Château de Bagatelle Watercolour 313 x 532 mm., 12 3/8 x 21 in. Literature Berndt H. Dams and Andrew Zega, Pleasure Pavillions and Follies, In the Gardens of the Ancien Régime, Paris and New York, 1995, p.116.

This is one of a series of watercolours, by the architectural historians and illustrators Berndt Dams and Andrew Zega, of significant examples of garden architecture in France in the century and a half before the Revolution. As the late Charles Ryskamp has noted of these works, ‘The paintings are brilliant and original. The author/artists, American and German, have captured the French genius of these buildings through the medium of watercolor, which enables the rendition of various building materials and surfaces with remarkable versatility and sensitivity…The paintings are abstractions of the elevations of the main facades of each building; yet they are also informative of the architectural peculiarities of the entire structure. The resulting illustrations both document the architectural past and are modern works of art in their own right.’

The Château de Bagatelle, in the Bois de Boulogne in Paris, was a small neoclassical château built in 1777 by the architect François-Joseph Bélanger for the Comte d’Artois, the brother of Louis XVI. Marie-Antoinette, the Comte’s sister-in-law, famously wagered 100,000 livres that the new château could not be completed within nine weeks. The Comte won the bet, with the house completed in only sixty-four days by a team of nine hundred workers, at the cost of three million livres. The interior of the château, also designed by Bélanger, included landscape paintings commissioned from Hubert Robert, while the extensive gardens – incorporating numerous architectural follies, including a Chinese Bridge, an Egyptian Obelisk, a Chinese 105


SOFA

99 VICTOR KOULBAK Born 1946

medium of silverpoint, which features in his work from 1990 onwards. The present sheet was drawn in 2005. ‘When I saw silverpoint for the first time, I was bowled over. I read that the masters used to prepare their gesso by burning chicken bones and mixing them with glue made of rabbit skins. This creates a rough surface to which the particles of silver adhere and act like microscopic mirrors reflecting the light. As the drawing progresses, the layer of silver thickens and begins to act like a mirror. It becomes increasingly difficult to gauge how far away from the drawing you’re standing. It ‘floats’ in the air, suffused with life and energy. Leonardo considered it the finest technique of all.’ (Victor Koulbak).

Model Silverpoint, with touches of watercolour 318 x 259 mm., 12 ½ x 10 in. Victor Koulbak was born in Moscow and studied there, beginning his career as a commercial draughtsman and illustrator. In 1975 he left Russia and settled first in Vienna and later in France. He established a reputation for drawing in the techniques of Renaissance masters, in particular the 106


SOFA

100

‘Galileo was the first astronomer to reveal the moon’s craters and mountains. His watercolour sketches from 1609 struck me by their beautiful simplicity and strength. For this drawing I used a combination of different blue inks – mostly indigo, Prussian blue and cobalt – that reacted on the paper that was almost like a photographic process. I wanted to capture the very moment of looking through a telescope and being silenced by the tireless vision of the sky. What also appears is the question of scale, as the planet could be mistaken for a mineral, a cell.’ (Caroline Corbasson).

CAROLINE CORBASSON

Born 1990 Galileo Pen and blue ink on paper Signed with initials and dated CC 2011 at the lower right 500 x 500 mm., 19 5/8 x 19 5/8 in. 107


INDEX OF ARTISTS

AUBRY, Etienne

no.8

BAKER OF LEAMINGTON, Thomas

no.66

BARBIER, George

no.85

BENIGNI, Léon

no.87

DAMS, Berndt and ZEGA, Andrew

no.98

DE WINT, Peter

no.31

EVENEPOEL, Henri

no.67

FARINGTON, Joseph

no.7

BESNARD, Paul-Albert

no.63

FENZONI, Ferrau

no.1

BIRKET FOSTER, Myles

no.59

FEROGIO, François

no.27

BOUDIN, Eugène

no.53

FIELDING, Anthony Vandyke Copley no.40, 48

BOURGEOIS, Constant

no.14

FIELDING, Newton Smith Limbird

no.25

BOYCE, George Price

no.71

FRASER GARDEN, William

no.72

BRABAZON, Hercules Brabazon

no.54

FRENCH, Annie

no.80

BRANGWYN, Frank

no.90

FOUJITA, Tsuguhar

no.81

BRUNELLESCHI, Umberto

no.88

FRENCH SCHOOL, 18th Century

no.9

BUCHANAN, Hugh

no.97

FRENCH SCHOOL, 19th Century

no.28

BULLEID, George Lawrence

no.56

FROST, George

no.12

CARTER, Henry Barlow

no.58

GOBAUT, Gaspard

no.30

CAYLEY ROBINSON, Frederick

no.73

GRANDVILLE, J. J.

no.24

CLAIRIN, Georges

no.61

GRUAU, René

no.96

COLLIER, Thomas

no.75

COLLINGWOOD, William

no.41

HARDING, James Duffield

no.42

CONRADE, Alfred Charles

no.83

HARDY, DeWitt

no.93

no.100

HAVELL, William

no.17

HILLS, Robert

no.22

HINE, Harry T.

no.47

CORBASSON, Caroline COWLES, Fleur COX, David

no.95 nos.33, 34

CROMEK, Thomas Hartley

no.44

HUNT, Alfred William

nos.68, 69

CROSS, Henri Edmond

no.64

HUNT, William Henry

no.32

CURNOCK, James Jackson

no.62

HUYOT, Albert

no.77

108


INCHBOLD, John William

POYNTER, Ambrose

no.50

no.3

PYNE, George

no.49

JENNINGS, Humphrey

no.91

RICCI, Marco

no.5

JOHNSON, Harry John

no.65

RICHARDSON SENIOR, Thomas Miles no.57

ITALIAN SCHOOL, circa 1700

no.78

ROOKE, Noel

no.55

SAND, George

no.35

SANDBY, Paul

no.10

SOROLLA, Joaquín

no.84

nos.51, 52

SPINK, Gerald

no.82

LEMAN, Robert

no.38

SUHR, William

no.79

LE SIDANER, Henri

no.76

LINNELL, John

no.20

TOMKINS, Charles

no.11 no.13

KOULBAK, Victor LAMORNA BIRCH, Samuel John LARGILLIERE, Nicolas de LEAR, Edward

LORRAIN, Claude Gellée, called

no.99 no.89 no.4

no.2

LOUND, Thomas

no.37

UWINS, Thomas

MAINELLA, Raffaelle

no.60

VARLEY, John

MOREAU, Jean-Michel

no.16

VEITH, Robert

no.15

MORELLI, Domenico

no.43 VENEZIANI, Ubaldo Cosimo

no.74

MULLER, William James

nos.45, 46

nos.18, 19, 39

NASH, John

no.92

WARD, James

no.26

NEWLAND, Anne

no.94

WATTS, Frederick William

no.23

WEEKS, Edwin Lord

no.36

WOOD, Thomas Peploe

no.29

PATON, Waller Hugh

no.70

PAYNE, William

no.21

PETITOT, Ennemond-Alexandre PISSARRO, Paul-Emile

no.6 no.86

109


Stephen Ongpin has more than twenty years of experience as a dealer in Old Master and 19th century drawings. He began his career in 1986 at the long-established gallery of P. & D. Colnaghi, working at the firm's New York branch for ten years before moving to London in 1996. Working closely with Jean-Luc Baroni, Stephen was responsible for organizing the drawings exhibitions mounted by the gallery, and for researching, writing, and editing their annual catalogues of Master Drawings. In 2001 he joined Baroni in forming Jean-Luc Baroni Ltd. in London, with Stephen continuing to assume responsibility for the new firm's drawing department, organizing their successful drawings exhibitions and writing the accompanying catalogues. He has to date researched and written nearly thirty scholarly catalogues of drawings. Since 2006 Stephen has worked as an independent dealer and consultant in the field of Old Master, 19th century and Modern drawings, assisted by Lavinia Harrington, and sharing a gallery in St. James's in London with Guy Peppiatt. The gallery exhibits at several art fairs, including the Salon du Dessin in Paris and The European Fine Art Fair in Maastricht in March, and Frieze Masters in London in October. Stephen Ongpin Fine Art mounts annual exhibitions of drawings in both London and New York, and also issues regular catalogues.

Guy Peppiatt started his working life at Dulwich Picture Gallery before joining Sotheby's British Pictures department in 1993. He quickly specialised in early British drawings and watercolours and took over the running of Sotheby's Topographical and Travel sales. Topographical views, whether they be of Britain or worldwide, have remained an abiding passion. Guy left Sotheby's in early 2004 and has worked as a dealer since then, first based at home, and now in a gallery in St James's, which he shares with Stephen Ongpin. Guy's main yearly exhibition of early drawings and watercolours is in May and June and he also exhibits at the Watercolours and Works on Paper Fair in early February, the BADA Fair in March, the Art Antiques London Fair in June and the Winter Olympia Art and Antiques Fair in November. He also advises clients on their collections, buys and sells on their behalf and can provide insurance valuations.

Stephen Ongpin Fine Art Tel.+44 (0) 20 7930 8813 or + 44 (0)7710 328 627 info@stephenongpinfineart.com www.stephenongpin.com

Guy Peppiatt Fine Art Tel.+44 (0) 20 7930 3839 or +44 (0)7956 968 284 guy@peppiattfineart.co.uk www.peppiattfineart.co.uk 110



ONE HUNDRED DRAWINGS & WATERCOLOURS STEPHEN ONGPIN GUY PEPPIATT

Riverwide House 6 Mason’s Yard Duke Street, St James’s London SW1Y 6BU

2013-2014

Stephen Ongpin Fine Art Guy Peppiatt Fine Art Ltd.

ONE HUNDRED DRAWINGS AND WATERCOLOURS


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.