The head of a brow cow

Signed l.r.: W. HUNT, watercolour over pencil with scratching out34 x 24.5 cm.; 13 3/8 x 9 5/8 inchesProvenanceJ.P. Heseltine (1843-1929);Christopher W. Witt, Buckinghamshire;The Bourne Gallery, Surrey;David Pike (1936-2024)LiteratureJ.P. Heseltine, John Varley and his Pupils, W. Mulready, J. Linnell and W. Hunt. Original Drawings in the Collection of J.P.H. 1918, ill. p. 13;John Witt, William Henry Hunt (1790-1864) Life and Works, with a catalogue, no. 539, ill. pl. 66This shows Sarah Hunt, the artist’s wife, aged about twenty-one reading a letter. The couple were married in 1830 and Hunt used his wife as a model in 1830s, when this work was drawn. It may be compared with a similar example in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum entitled ‘Love Missive' (J. Witt, no. 529). The same chest and chair can be seen in both works.John Postle Heseltine (1843-1929) was a stockbroker and senior partner in the family firm, Heseltine, Powell & Co. He was a draughtsman and etcher, a collector oil paintings, drawings and watercolours of the English and Continental schools and a Trustee of the National Gallery who advised on purchases.

Inscribed (recto): T Von Holst, pencil and pen and brown ink, verso: pencil, on laid paper with a partial Strasburg Lily watermark, laid down on a brown sheet numbered 1027.2 x 21.4 cm; 10 3⁄4 x 8 1⁄2 inchesProvenanceJohn Welch Etherington Rolls (1807-1870);By family descent to Lady Shelley Rolls, her sale at Sotheby’s, London,12 June 1959;P. & D. Colnaghi;Private collection U.K. until 2019Von Holst’s drawing of the seated woman, recto, is after a figure in Raphael’s ‘Miraculous Draft of Fishes’; the drawing for the tapestry cartoon is in the Albertina, Vienna. A print was made after the drawing, which von Holst probably copied. The figure of the standing female on the recto is a characteristic Holst pose, derived from Vincenzo Danti’s bronze statue of Venus in the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence (see Max Browne, The Romantic Art of Theodor von Holst 1810-44, 1994, p.15).The drawing on the verso illustrates a scene inspired by a Gothic novel such as The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe, published in 1794. One of the most popular novels of its day, its main character Emily St. Aubert, a virtuous and beautiful young woman, undertakes a series of dramatic adventures; she escapes from captivity at the hands of a cruel villain in a brooding castle to freedom.The brown card inlay on which the present drawing is contained is from the Rolls album, a large leather-bound album which forms the largest-known group of drawings by the artist. The family lived at The Hendre in Monmouthshire, where they also had at least five oils by von Holst. They were also involved with the theatre and opened their own in the grounds.The pencil inscription “T. Von Holst’ appears on almost all the drawings in the album and is effectively its collection mark.

Inscribed and dated l.l.: Monte Generoso/1879, and further inscribed with colour notes, pen and brown ink over pencil25 x 51.5 cm; 9 7/8 x 20 1/4 inches£8500Lear returned to Varese and Monte Generoso, on the border between Italy and Switzerland between lakes Lugano and Como, from June 29 to September 22 1879. He stayed at Mendrisio, across the Swiss border in Ticino. He enjoyed sketching the views south across the plains, as in the present watercolour and the mountains stretching up to the Alps. Marianne North the botanical artist came to Como towards the end of his stay and they made a trip to Monte Civita near Monza together.This drawing is taken from a similar vantage point to that of an oil of the same subject dated 1880 in the collection of the Ashmolean Museum (WA196.39).An unpublished poem “The Lays of the Octopods’ about the perils of mass tourism at Monte Generoso has recently come to light in the British Library.

Inscribed l.r.: Bruges, watercolour7.6 x 11.4 cm; 3 x 4½ inchesProvenanceSpink & Son Ltd, London, K3/1890b, part of a group purchased from Appleby Brothers, 2 August 1960.This spontaneous, on-the-spot sketch was presumably done when Cox visited Bruges in 1826. His first trip to the Continent was organised by his brother-in-law Mr Gardener, an agent for the sale of government ordnance maps who had premises at 163 Regent Street, London. Gardener persuaded Cox and his son David Cox Jr to accompany him on a business trip to Brussels. The party travelled from Dover to Calais and then, travelling by diligence, on to Dunkerque, Bruges and Brussels. Cox evidently liked the caps worn by the market women in Belgium as he sketched them again in Brussels.1 1.See N. Neil Solly, Memoir of the Life of David Cox, 1873, reprinted 1973, p. 49.

Henry Pilleau (1813-1899)The Dead SeaSigned with monogram l.l., watercolour 21 x 38 cm.; 8 ¼ x 15 inchesProvenancePresented to Queen Victoria in 1887 for her Golden Jubilee by the Royal Society of Water-Colour PaintersPilleau served with 16th Lancers. He is best known for his colourful watercolours and prints of Egypt. He visited Egypt in 1840s with Lieutenant -Colonel Sir George Everest (1790-1866), Surveyor-General of India, presumably on the men’s way to India. Pilleau’s ‘Sketches in Egypt’ comprising 12 lithographs was published in London in 1845 by Dickinson and dedicated to Everest. It comprises text and colourful plates of famous views and sites. Everest, a Welsh surveyor and geographer, after whom Mount Everest was named, served as the Surveyor General of India (1830–1843) and worked on the Great Trigonometric Survey of India.This watercolour left the Royal collection in the early twentieth century together with a substantial number of other works on paper, and there is no documentation for this with the Royal Collection. The other works whose details are recorded on the sheet of Windsor notepaper attached to the backboard were also dispersed at this time ( from the Royal Cambrian Academy of Art gift, Llyn Crafnant by D.W. Barker (the rendering of his name as ‘Banken’ suggests that someone was inaccurately copying from another source); Time-Honoured Lancaster by R. Aspinwall; and A Breezy Day by R. Short).

Pencil on laid paper, partially watermarked and countermarked 181914.5 x 10.9 cm.; 5 ¾ x 4 ¼ inchesProvenance: Cyril and Shirley Fry until 2021Literature: J. Witt, 'William Henry Hunt (1790-1864)', 1982, no. 369Exhibited: 'Hunt Exhibition Fry Collection', 1967, no. 17 (2)This work dates from c. 1820.

Pen and grey ink and watercolour and pencil27.4 x 43.1 cm.; 10 3⁄4 x 17 inchesProvenanceChristie’s, London, 21 November 2002, lot 20; where bought by the previous owner;Private collection, U.K., until 2022The present work is a significant example of Rowlandson’s landscape draughtsmanship. It probably dates from the same time as a smaller view of Glastonbury showing the abbey from the main street and marketplace of the town in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum (Dyce Collection) which was etched by the artist as plate 24 of Rowlandson's World in Miniature, No. 2, 1816. Rowlandson has used a certain amount of artistic license in his interpretation of the topography.

Charles Gore (1729-1807)A view of the East front of Arundel Castle, West Sussex, seen from the Bowling GreenInscribed l. r.: Arundel Castle taken from the Platform or/Bowling Green by Charles Gore Esq 1781 and indistinctly inscribed in pencil u. r.: Arundel Castle Sufsex/1781Watercolour over touches of pencil on laid paper, with a Whatman watermark19.6 by 49 cm., 7 ¾ by 19 ¼ inchesProvenanceIolo Williams (1890-1962); And by descent until sold Sotheby's, London, 13 July 1989, lot 5; Private collection;With Guy Peppiatt Fine ArtThe bowling green is the name for the square earthworks located, with the fishponds, on the east side of the castle. They were probably made originally to improve the castle’s defences during the Civil War. Used as a bowling green in eighteenth century, as shown in the drawing by Charles Gore, today a rose garden can be found here. The Hon. Charles Gore was the son of a Lincolnshire landowner and educated at Westminster. He married a wealthy heiress of a shipbuilding company and learnt to draw and design ships. Gore travelled extensively in Europe, sketching with the German artist Jacob Philipp Hackert (1737-1807). Gore copied marine oils, completed the unfinished drawings of other artists, and also developed his own style having acquired an expert knowledge of the sea. His interest in classical antiquities led Charles Gore to join Hackert and Richard Payne Knight on their expedition to Sicily from April to June 1777.In 1779 Gore returned to England and became a member of the Dilettanti Society in 1781. He painted a series of panoramic views of Sussex including the current drawing. The family returned to the Continent in 1782 and he settled in Weimar in 1791 with his daughter Eliza. Examples of Gore's work can be found in the British Museum, the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich and the Goethe-Nationalmuseum, Weimar.

KT524Signed and dated l.c.: L Francia 1828 (?), watercolour with scratching out19.7 x 27.5 cm.;7 ¾ x 10 ¾ inchesProvenanceSotheby’s, London, 7 June 2006, lot 356;Bonhams, London, 23 September 2008, lot 40This charming view of London from Greenwich is painted from a similar vantage point to the artist’s famous self-portrait in Greenwich Park, in the collection of the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Calais (Inv.86-57-2). The towers of the hospital can be seen in the present drawing, with the dome of St Paul’s cathedral looming between them on the horizon.Francia was Bonington’s teacher whose work provides an important link between British and French watercolour painting in the early nineteenth century. A native of Calais, he left for London in 1788 after the outbreak of the French Revolution and remained until 1817. He established a practice as a drawing master in London and a reputation as a painter of marine and landscape watercolours. He attended the Monro ‘Academy’, made sketching tours, was secretary of the Brothers, a sketching club of which Girtin was a member and was also secretary of the Associated Artists in Water Colours. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1795-1822. Francia returned to Calais in 1817. He gave Bonington his first professional lessons in watercolour in Calais as well as other artists including William Wyld, Eugène Isabey, Tesson and Collignon. British and French artists who passed through the town on a tour of the coast or en route to Paris or London would visit him.

KT488Signed and inscribed on the old backing board attached to reverse: View of Shipton on Charwell [sic]-Evening.\W. Turner./Oxfd., watercolour over traces of pencil25.6 x 41 cm.; 10 x 16 inchesProvenanceW/S Fine Art Ltd., ‘Watercolours and Drawings’, June 2005, no. 47;Private collection U.K. until 2021This view shows the manor house and part of the estate of the artist’s uncle, William Turner, and the church of Holy Cross, amongst the trees to the right of the house. The artist built the church, in fourteenth -century style, at the expense of his uncle. It is thus an intensely personal work in which the artist depicts his home and the only building he designed.William Turner Senior had supported the artistic training of his nephew after his father died. In 1804 he bought the estate of Shipton-on-Cherwell with its manor house and park, as seen in the present watercolour. In 1809 the young artist recorded his address as Shipton (Martin Hardie, ‘William Turner of Oxford’, The Old Water-Colour Society’s Club, IX, 1932, p. 2).Turner first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1807 and in January 1808 he became the youngest associate of the Society of Painters in Water Colours and was elected a full member in November of that year.The church, which seems to be Turner of Oxford’s only architectural work, dates from 1831. The artist was buried there at his death in 1862 and in 1896 a screen was erected in his memory.Some of the artist’s most celebrated watercolours are of water lilies on the River Cherwell, and from 1835 he sent a number to the exhibitions at the Society of Painters in Water Colours. The earliest of these, now in the collection of the Yale Center for British Art (B1981.24), shows the church at Shipton-on-Cherwell in the trees in the distance, a focal point of the composition.