Paul-César Helleu Alice Helleu à sa toilette

Signed and inscribed verso: Far away in Cloudland/BWSpiers/And when the smoke ascends on high/Then thou behold'st the vanity of worldly stuff/Gone with a puff/thus think, and smoke tobacco-/G.W.-Smoking Spiritualised, watercolour over pencil heightened with gum arabic and touches of white, and further inscribed on original backing: B.W. Spiers Far Away13.5 x 18cm; 5 1/2 x 7 1/8 inchesBenjamin Walter Spiers (1845-1894) was an idiosyncratic painter of studio still lives who lived in London, at 70 Hereford Road in Bayswater, where the current watercolour may have been drawn. He crammed his antiquarian pictures with books, furniture, objects and paintings a number of which reappear in several of his still lifes. He often drew corners of interiors of his favourite antique shops in London’s Wardour Street. The bust and the chair shown in the present work appear in several of his compositions. He was captured here by an artist with the initials G W who has caught him relaxing with a cigarette in his studio. Spiers often penned a verse to accompany a picture, as in the present work.It is amusing seeing the tables turned and the artist drawn as the subject of his own studio interior. Spiers’ extraordinary fidelity in his own painting and his eclectic taste makes him the leading exponent of a particular type of 19th century interior painting. The dealer and scholar Christopher Wood considered him to be ‘one of the most remarkable painters of still-life in English Art’ (see C. Wood, ‘Knicknacks and silly Old Books’, 'Country Life', 10 June 1993, pp. 124-125).Christie’s London had a large group of Spiers work for sale on 14 December 2016. In one of these works 'Worthless old knickknacks and silly old books', based on the poem 'The Cane-Bottom'd Chair' by Thackeray, the same painting of Gainsborough's (lost) 'Cottage Children', which hangs over the fireplace in the present work, can be seen.Spiers was interested in possessions rather than objects of nature and his curiosity for antiquarian objects, books, maps, prints and china is displayed with trompe-l’oeil accuracy in his watercolours. The same objects repeatedly appear which suggests that Spiers owned them.Little is known about Spiers’ life. He lived in London, first at 17 Hereford Street, Bayswater, and then at Longwood in Acol Road, West Hampstead. He is thought to be related to Richard Phené Spiers, the architect, whose brother, Walter Spiers was a curator of the Soane Museum. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1876 to 1891, and 'The Times' Academy notice for 27 June 1881 says of his two exhibited works, ‘We consider these two works to be the gems of the water- colour gallery.’Christie’s London 14 December 2019, lot 80

Stamped with studio stamp l.r. and inscribed: Venice, watercolour15 x 23.5 cm.; 5 7/8 x 5 ½ inches, framed size 32 x 39 cm.; 12 1/2 x 15 1/4 inchesFrom an album of watercolours by the artist.Johnson was born in Birmingham where he studied under Samuel Restell Lines. He was then a pupil of William James Müller in London from circa 1842/3-1845, accompanying him to Lycia at the time of Sir Charles Fellowes’ expedition in 1843. The artists travelled for around eight months, spending time in Xanthus, Pinara and Tlos before going to to Rhodes and Smyrna and presumably visited Venice at this time. Johnson, like Müller, continued to work on subjects from this trip after his return to England.On Johnson’s return to London, he became a founder member of the Clipstone Street Academy, along with Müller, participating in its life drawing and painting sessions with a variety of models from the streets. Johnson made sketching trips with David Cox to North Wales from 1844.The artist was elected an associate member of the R.I. in 1868 and a full member two years later. His work can be found in many museum collections, including the British Museum, Victoria & Albert Museum and the Fitzwilliam Museum.

Signed, inscribed and dated l.r.: Cave on the Island/of Elephanta/Dec 9th. 69 and further signed by another, watercolour over pencil.The artist visited the famous Hindu temple carved into the rockface on the island of Elephanta. Constructed between the fifth and sixth century, the temple is part of the ‘City of Caves’ devoted to the cult of Shiva.For further work by this artist please see the catalogue link and enquire about availability.

KT475Dated l.r.: Aug 11, watercolour over pencil with a touch of white on grey paper17.1 x 26.1 cm.; 6 ¾ x 10 ¼ inchesProvenanceBernard Squire, Portman Square, London;Arnold Fellows, collection no. 23;Bequeathed to Queen Mary’s Grammar School, Walsall until sold by a charitable trust, 2023Lewis visited Arran in 1830. A similar drawing of identical size dated two days later is in the collection of the Courtauld Institute of Art, The Witt Collection ( D.1952.RW.3018).Arnold Fellows was a pupil at Queen Mary’s Grammar School, Walsall, between 1911 and 1917. He became a master of the school for a brief period, before moving to spend the remainder of his life as a teacher at Chigwell School in Essex. Fellows devoted much of his life to collecting art, notably works on paper, and eventually donated his entire collection to Queen Mary’s Grammar School.He was the author of The wayfarer's companion : England's history in her buildings and countryside, published by Oxford University Press, 1937.

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.

Sara Page (1855-1943)Portrait of MarieSigned l.l.: S Page, inscribed u.l.: MARIE, oil on board, labelattached verso: Papeterie F. Dupré, 141 Faubourg St Honoré, Paris46 x 38 cm.; 18 x 15 inchesLiteratureOlga Baird (Yatsenko), Sara Wells Page (1855-1943): a Parisianartist from Wolverhampton, 2022, p. 12 (ill). Sara Page was born in Moxley, Staffordshire, the fourth child of Samuel Page, a successful timber merchant, and his wife Sara Wells Page, the daughter of a wealthy local ironmaster. Her parents died in the 1870s leaving her and her siblings financially independent. From 1884-1891 she studied drawing at Wolverhampton School of Art and then travelled to Italy to continue her artistic education, making copies in oil after originals in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. She was photographed in Venice by the photographers Fratelli Vianelli.In 1892, having been encouraged by Sir Frederick Leighton, Page went to Paris to study at the Académie Julian, under Bouguereau, Tony Robert-Fleury and Gabriel Ferrier. Male and female students received the same training which included drawing from live models, the sexes taught in separate ateliers. One of the ateliers for female students was at 5 rue de Berri. Page wrote that she ‘worked under the best French artists at the Académie Julian and found there both guidance and much interest in the companionship of many different nations, and as all the students (about 500) competed in efforts for the medal in painting and sculpture, life was animated’25. Page received a medal for portrait painting.

Signed and dated l.r.: SOPHIA BEALE/1869, watercolour heightened with bodycolour and gum arabic34.5 x 60 cm; 13 ¾ x 23 ½ inchesProvenanceBrightwell’s, Leominster, 12 January 2004; where purchased byPaddy Docker-Drysdale (1929-2020);By descent until 2022This substantial landscape of Heidelberg is a fine example of a detailed Pre-Raphaelite landscape. The skillful use of bodycolour applied with a dry brush creates a pleasing richness which combined with the play of dappled sunlight on the mossy rocks in the foreground and the careful selection of colours elevates the view well above topography.Beale was born in London to Frances, née Smith, and Lionel John Beale, a surgeon. Her sister, Ellen Brooker Beale, was also an artist with whom she collaborated. Sophia and Ellen Beale went to Queen’s College School, London and took art lessons at the popular Leigh’s Academy run by the artist Matthew Leigh. They copied extensively after the Old Masters and antiquities in the National Gallery and British Museum.From 1860 to 1867 the two sisters shared a studio on Long Acre in Covent Garden. In 1869 Sophia Beale travelled in Germany and France, when the present work was drawn, and in 1872 she returned to Paris, where she took classes run for women at Charles Joshua Chaplin’s (1825-1891) studio (where Mary Cassatt also studied), financing her studies by working at M. Bertin’s studio. On her return to London, Beale used the money she had earned in Paris to open an art school in Albany Street, near Regent’s Park, teaching the latest Parisian techniques.Beale was a feminist and in 1889 among the two thousand signatories to the ‘Declaration in Favour of Women's Suffrage’ formulated by the Central Committee for Women’s Suffrage. Beale also advocated for the Royal Academy and the universities to allow greater access for women.The artist exhibited extensively during her lifetime at the Society of British Artists in Sussex Street, where she showed around thirty works, while she also had four works accepted by the Royal Academy between 1863 and 1887. Between 1868 and 1882 she exhibited at the Royal Hibernian Academy and with the Society of Women Artists from 1860 to 1881. She published four books, A guide to the Louvre (1883), The Amateur’s Guide to Architecture (1887), The Churches of Paris from Clovis to Charles X (1893) and her autobiography, Recollections of a Spinster Aunt (1908). She also wrote articles including a review of the 1894 exhibition ‘Fair Women’ at the Grafton Gallery in London for The American Architect and Building News (1876-1908), Boston 45, no. 975 (see Meaghan Clark, Fashionability, Exhibition Culture and Gender Politics: Fair Women, 2021, p. 21).

Watercolour17.5 by 25.5 cmTwo of the dogs are terrier types (Irish terrier on the left, and black and tan on the right) and the white dog with brown spots is a pointer type.Provenance: Augusta Raymond-Barker, Fairford Park, Gloucestershire; thence by family descent until 2016The artist was the youngest son of portrait painter Nathan Theodore Fielding. From 1827 to 1830 he lived in Paris, where he ran the family engraving business, at which William Callow worked. He was closely associated with the Anglo-French circle of artists centred around Bonington and Delacroix.He collaborated with his brothers Thales and Theodore in England before returning to France where he built up an extensive teaching practice, with pupils including members of the family of King Louis- Philippe. He published a number of teaching manuals and lived in France until his death.

William Wallace Collett-Mason (1895-1957)A young Indian man in military uniform and a turban holding a bayonetPencil, black chalk and watercolour57 x 36 cm.; 22 ½ x 14 ¼ inchesThis work was most probably drawn in the Jhelum area of the Punjab, now in Pakistan, near the border with Kashmir. From May 1921, Jhelum hosted the 10th Battalion of the newly reorganised 1st Punjab Regiment. The subject may be a soldier or a member of the Balochistan police force. His turban is in the style of the "Kulla Wali Pagh" which includes a "Cone Cap", which was worn by Punjabi Muslims. Head and shoulders portrait in profile of Supharas Khan from Jhelum with a comb in his hairPencil and black chalk, with a sketch of his torso verso56.5 x 35.5 cm.; 22 ¼ x 14 inches The sitter Supharas Khan came from the Jhelum area of the Punjab, now in Pakistan, near the border with Kashmir.Head and shoulders portrait of Supharas Khan, wearing a shirt and with a comb in his hairInscribed l.l.: Subharas Khan. 26/Punjab. From jelhum, pencil, with a sketch l.l.56.5 x 35.5 cm.; 22 ¼ x 14 inches The sitter is drawn from the front. The Jhelum area of the Punjab is now in Pakistan, near the border with Kashmir. From May 1921, Jhelum hosted the 10th Battalion of the newly reorganised 1st Punjab Regiment.Head and shoulders portrait of Supharas Khan, wearing a shirt with a comb in his hairInscribed l.l: S, pencil56.5 x 35.5 cm.; 22 ¼ x 14 inches Portrait of a young Indian man wearing a turbanSigned l.r.: COLLET-MASON -, pencil 56.5 x 35.5 cm.; 22 ¼ x 14 inches ProvenanceBy descent in the family of the artist until 2025

Watercolour, with a pencil sketch of a house in a landscape verso, on laid paper11.2 x 13 cmProvenance: William Arnold Sandby; John Manning, London; Private collection, UK until 2017William Arnold Sandby (c. 1828-1904) was the great-grandson of Thomas Sandby, author of the first book about the artists, Thomas and Paul Sandby-Royal Academicians, 1892, and the historian of the Royal Academy (two volumes of its history published in 1862). He had a large collection of the work of his forebears, helped organise their first exhibition at Nottingham Castle Museum in 1884 and bequeathed many of their works to museum collections.