Description
An original 1877 watercolour painting, Attrib. Richard Doyle Fir Tree, Sunningdale, Berkshire. An attractive watercolour. On paper laid down on backing paper. The painting is accompanied by an inscription on a separate fragment of paper: "Sunningdale, Berks". This outstanding collection of watercolours & pen & ink illustrations records a European tour of 1877-8. The collection comprises paintings of sublime mountain peaks & glaciers in the Swiss & Italian Alps, which, whilst typically picturesque in their composition & subject, are strikingly modern & graphic in their application of flat blocks & striations of colour. The collection also includes a number of characterful, keenly observed illustrations depicting local personalitiesthe Swiss waiter, Italian musicians & Monte Carlo gamblers. These illustrations appear to be by the same hand as the watercolours; some are inscribed on the front or verso, & most have an accompanying inscription on a separate fragment of paperall in the same hand. We acquired the collection with accompanying cataloguing information (see sheets pictured), which lists the titles of the pictures & also gives the attribution Richard Doyle (1824-1883). Richard Doyle was a Victorian artist, best known for his illustrations for Punch & also his fairy paintings. Doyle joined the staff of Punch in 1843, aged just nineteen, & in 1844 he designed the intricate front cover which was used as the magazine's signature until the middle of the 20th century. Richard Doyle was the son of Irish cartoonist John Doyle (1783-1851), & a natural heir to George Cruikshank. Working as a freelance illustrator his masterpiece was in Fairyland (1869-70), a book ostensibly designed for children but with coded adult themes. He was a friend of Holman Hunt & William Makepeace Thackeray, & he was at home in the company of Millais, Rossetti, Dickens & Cruikshank. The illustrations in this collection display Doyle's humour & lightness of touch. & these works are not the first time Doyle recorded his foreign travels on paper. in 1854 he had penned a book entitled 'The Foreign Tour of Messrs. Brown, Jones & Robinson: Being the History of What They Saw, & Did, in Belgium, Germany, Switzerland & Italy' in which he recorded the local sights & characters encountered by three companions during a summer's excursion to Germany & northern Italy. in good condition for its age. Minor foxing to the verso, which does not affect the front. Attrib. Richard Doyle, Fir Tree Sunningdale Berkshire -1877 Watercolour Painting
