Lady Emily Dundas The Ladies of Llangollen at Plas Newydd

KT514 Signed and dated on mount l.l.: E. Dayes 1791, pen and grey ink and watercolour with touches of bodycolour over traces of pencil on wove paper, on original laid paper mount 21 x 13.9 cm.; 8 ¼ x 5 ½ inches Provenance Sotheby’s, 25 January 1989, lot 54, where bought by James Hall, his collection no. 23, until 2022 The Abbey was founded for the Cistercians between 1175 and 1178 by Hervey de Montemarisco, Marshall of Henry II, who became its first abbot. At the Reformation Henry VIII granted the Abbey to Sir Osborne Itchingham. The church is one of the longest Cistercian churches in Ireland.

Pen and black ink over pencil Each 13 x 21 cm.; 5 x 8 ½ inches Provenance J.M. Hunter, purchased from The Fine Art Society 22 November 1968 until 2023 Exhibited The Fine Art Society Ltd., London, 'Edward Bawden, CBE, RA - Recent works', 1968 Literature Claudia Roden, 'A Book of Middle Eastern Food', published by Thomas Nelson, London, 1968, with photographs by Pinkard, and black and white illustrations at the head of each chapter by Edward Bawden. These are the original drawings used to illustrated Claudia Roden’s (b. 1936) first cookery book on Middle Eastern food which mixed Bawden’s playful drawings with modern food photography and revolutionised Western attitudes to the cuisines of the Middle East and North Africa. It was substantially expanded and published in a new edition in 1986. She is the author of ten popular and critically-acclaimed cookery books and has a particular interest in the social and historical background of cooking. Bawden lived in Great Bardfield in Essex from the 1930s to 1970 and was a central figure of the Great Bardfield Artists.

Inscribed l.l.: TRENANT SIR E. BULLERS., pen and grey ink and watercolour over traces of pencil 14 x 23.3 cm; 5 ½ x 9 1/8 inches Provenance J.A.D. Bridger, his sale at Sotheby’s London, 24 January 1951, lot 150; bought by Thomas Agnew & Sons Ltd.; H.M. Langton; Spink & Son Ltd., K3/1993; Exhibited Thomas Agnew & Sons Ltd., 80th Annual Exhibition of Water-colour Drawings (January – March 1953), no. 85 Rowlandson worked extensively in the West Country early in his career and made annual tours. He usually stayed with his friend and patron Matthew Michell, a banker, who had an estate at Hengar near Bodmin in Cornwall. Sir Edward Buller, 1st Baronet (24 December 1764 – 15 April 1824) was an officer in the Royal Navy who served during the American War of Independence, and the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. He was MP for East Looe in Cornwall from 1802-1820. He lived at Trenant Park in East Cornwall.

Watercolour 17.5 by 25.5 cm Two 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 2016 The 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.

Signed l.c.: E. Lear, pencil with watercolour, pen and black ink and touches of gold 17.7 x 23 cm.; 7 x 9 inches These charming, quirky drawings are characteristic early works by Lear, dating from the late 1820s or early 1830s when he was establishing himself as an ornithological artist. They relate to a group of drawings which Lear gave to Mrs Godfrey Wentworth, who supported his employment by the Zoological Society in 1831, and whom he credited with launching him as an artist. They are imaginary, fanciful subjects drawn with not a little humour, resembling the stylised watercolours of birds painted on late eighteenth century porcelain. Robert McCracken Peck has made the interesting suggestion that Lear and his sister Ann may have been thinking of approaching ceramics companies with them (see Robert McCracken Peck, The Natural History of Edward Lear, 2016, pp. 27-9). Two surviving family albums from the late 1820s, containing a mixture of similar natural history subjects by Edward Lear and his sisters Ann and Sarah, are in the collection of the Houghton Library, Harvard University (MS Typ 55.4 and 55.27). Sir Edward Strachey was a man of letters and friend of Lear’s, who wrote an introduction to Nonsense Songs in 1895. He lived at Sutton Court, Chew Magna in Somerset and was a neighbour of Lear’s close friend Chichester Fortescue, the Liberal politician whom Lear first met in Rome in 1845.

Pencil 9 x 15 cm.; 3 ½ x 6 inches Provenance The artist's studio sale, Christie's, 8 - 15 May 1874, bt. by Thomas Agnew & Sons Ltd. (23366); J.M.M., a Christmas present from C. 1962

Signed with monogram l.r., inscribed l.l.: near Calikut., watercolour heightened with touches of bodycolour Provenance Franklin Lushington (1823-1901) and thence by descent Lear was invited to India by his friend and patron Lord Northbrook who was appointed Viceroy in 1871, and his journey there was the last and longest of his life. He was overwhelmed by the colour and vitality of India and enjoyed the bustle of Viceregal life. Calicut, or present-day Kozhikode, is on the Malabar coast in Kerala and was a centre of the Indian spice trade. Edward Lear arrived there in October 1874, just as the monsoon began. He was warned about the dangers of contracting fever but stayed, despite the pouring rain, until the skies were clear enough to draw. He described the roads around the city as “of such redundant beauty one can hardly dream.” Franklin Lushington, Lear’s close friend and first owner of this drawing, was the son of Edmund Henry Lushington. He was appointed judge to the Supreme Court of Justice in the Ionian Islands in 1855 and Lear went with him to live in Corfu. They first met in Malta in 1849, where Franklin’s elder brother Henry was Chief Secretary to the government. On his death, Lear left all his papers to Lushington, who later destroyed most of them.

Signed with initials l.l.: TC, oil on paper laid down on canvas 26.5 x 36 cm.; 10 3/8 x 14 1/8 inches The artist studied in Birmingham under Joseph V. Barber (1788-1838) and moved to London in 1828. He was one of the leading practitioners of the Birmingham School of Artists and a founder member of the Etching Club. Creswick exhibited over 250 paintings in London during his lifetime at the Royal Academy and Suffolk Street Galleries, and also worked as an illustrator. He sought out subjects from the rivers and streams all over the British Isles. The present work has a pleasing spontaneity and sense of place which reflects Creswick’s habit of painting outside from nature. He was particularly drawn to streams which he painted many times. He revels in depicting the colours, shapes and textures of the boulders in the foreground of this work and excels himself conveying the softness of the moss on the first rock. John Ruskin praised Creswick’s handling of foliage and his observations from nature in the first volume of Modern Painters (1843). Oils on paper by him are comparatively rare. Creswick’s work is represented in many British institutional collections and the Yale Center for British Art, New Haven.

Chale Bay- looking out to sea from St Catherine’s Down and Oratory, Isle of Wight Watercolour over traces of pencil. 32.3 x 54.1 cm.; 12 ¾ x 21 ¼ inches Provenance Spink, London, sold 11 October 1956; Private collection U.K., until 2020; With Karen Taylor Fine Art; Private collection, U.K. until 2024 Turner of Oxford was in Sussex in 1846 from when this beautiful drawing may well date, as he made a large watercolour from near Portsmouth with the Isle of Wight in the distance in that year. He has chosen a calm day and the stillness of the shepherds amplifies the awe with which they are observing the beauty of nature. The location has an interesting history. In 1313, a ship, the St Mary of Bayonne, was blown off-course and ran aground on the treacherous Atherfield Ledge in Chale Bay. Its cargo of white wine was sold illegally by the sailors and many barrels found their way into the cellars of Walter de Godeton, Lord of the Manor of Chale. The ship came from Gascony, then part of King Edward II’s kingdom. He was not amused, and Walter de Godeton was fined by an ecclesiastical court. The Pope heard of the incident and, to avoid excommunication, de Godeton was ordered to build an oratory and beacon on Chale Down as penance.

Laura Knight, DBE, RA, RWS (1877-1970) Anna Pavlova rehearsing The Bacchanal, c. 1910-1911 Signed l.l.: Laura Knight, oil on canvas 45.5 x 41 cm.; 17 5/8 x 16 1/8 inches Provenance Peter and Vera Chadwick, 1977 (according to an inscription on the previous frame); Harry Greatorex, 1988; His sale at Sotheby’s, unidentified sale 1988(?), lot 73; Private collection U.K. until 2025 Knight captures the grace, elegance and kinetic energy of the most famous ballerina of her day on stage performing her most dynamic and erotic role. Pavlova (1881 – 1931) visited London with Sergei Diaghilev's company for the first time in the summer of 1910. She caused a sensation with her dramatic Dance Bacchanal from Pepita's ballet The Seasons, choreographed by Mikhail Fokine, which was to become one of her signature roles. An erotic duet, performed with Mikhail Mordkin saw the dancers throwing garlands and striking sensual poses with theatrical abandon, wearing Greek tunics. Knight was mesmerised by the Ballets Russes when they performed in London during the years before the First World War. In particular, she became enamoured with the dancer Anna Pavlova. In her autobiography, 1965, Knight wrote: ‘The whole look of Pavlova had perfection of finish … But whatever the beauty of form may have been, she possessed an attraction all her own ... a something not of this world.’ (L. Knight, The Magic of a Line, p. 161). In 1911 she made sketches of Pavlova at the Palace Theatre, continuing her interest in the figure in motion. Pavlova often invited Knight to her home, The Ivy House in Golders Green next to Hampstead Heath, which she bought in 1912, so she could sketch her. Knight drew Pavlova’s portrait many times as well as sketching her backstage and made small enamel pieces recording her dancing. Her work helped cement the dancer’s reputation in Britain and beyond. Pavlova settled in London after the Russian Revolution of 1917.