A Way of Life: The Collection of Barbara & Ernest Kafka
Francis Danby, A.R.A.
Fairies on the seashore
No reserve
Lot Closed
July 6, 02:16 PM GMT
Estimate
1,200 - 1,800 GBP
Lot Details
Description
A Way of Life: The Collection of Barbara & Ernest Kafka
Francis Danby, A.R.A.
Wexford 1793 - 1861 Exmouth
Fairies on the seashore
Watercolour over pencil, heightened with bodycolour;
together with Mountainous Landscape (English School, early 19th century), watercolour over pencil, heightened with stopping out
182 by 257 mm; 184 by 239 mm
(2)
Alaric Alexander Watts (1797-1864);
Walter Augustus Brandt (1902–1978);
with Agnew's, London,
where acquired by the late owners
Bristol, City Museum and Art Gallery and London, Tate Britain, Francis Danby 1793-1861, 1988-89, no. 111
E. Adams, Francis Danby: Varieties of Poetic Landscape, London 1973, no. 169;
F. Greenacre, Francis Danby 1793-1861, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery and City of Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, London 1988, pp. 147 & 167, no. 111
Engraved:
The first, by William Miller for Literary Souvenir, published by Alaric A. Watts 1833, p. 101
Fairies on the seashore is likely to have been commissioned by Alaric Alexander Watts in 1832 or 1833 and it was engraved for his 1833 publication: Literary Souvenir.
Painted during a traumatic period in the artist's life, a time when he was living - under great financial strain - in Switzerland, firstly at Rapperswill on Lake Zurich and then in Geneva.
The theme of fairy tales and magic clearly interested him during this decade and other works of this ilk survive at the Oldham Art Gallery: Scene from 'A Midsummer Night's Dream (1832) and at the Yale Center for British Art: Oberon and Titania, 1837.1
1. Greenacre, op. cit., pp. 146 & 147, nos. 109 and 110
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