Barks on the Thames at Lambeth, London
  • Peter de Wint
  • Stone/Staffordshire 1784 - 1849 London
  • Barks on the Thames at Lambeth, London
  • Watercolour over pencil, on paper
  • 219 × 190 mm
Provenance:
Harriet de Wint (the artist‘s wife)
Mrs. H. Tatlock (daughter)
Ms. H.H. Tatlock (granddaughter)
Ms. Muriel G. Bostock (a friend)
Sir Geoffrey Harmsworth with Agnew‘s, London 1990
Sale Gérald Bauer, Christie‘s London, Jan. 2003, lot 39
Andrew Wyld, London
Literature:
Gérald Bauer: Le Siècle d‘Or de l‘Aquarelle Anglaise, Paris 1998, p. 109, ill. 141
W. Hauptmann: L‘Age d‘Or de l‘Aquarelle Anglaise 1770-1900, Lausanne 1999, cat. no. 72, p. 123
Exhibition:
Lincoln 1937, Usher Art Gallery: Peter de Wint, no. 173
London 1990, Agnew‘s: 117th Annual Exhibition, no. 63
Lausanne 1999, Fondation de l‘Hermitage: L‘Age d‘Or de l‘Aquarelle Anglaise 1770–1900, no. 72
London 2008, W / S Fine Art: Summer Exhibition, no. 35

Among the young landscape painter Peter de Wint’s most important patrons were his role models John Varley (1778-1842) and Thomas Girtin (1775-1803), as well as the influential art collector Thomas Monro (1759-1833). After several years of independent work, de Wint turned his back on oil painting and specialized solely in the aquarelle technique, which had been held in high esteem in the United Kingdom since the 18th century.

At the beginning of the 19th century, even rival groups of artists who felt exclusively committed to watercolour painting joined together to create associations like the Royal Watercolour Society (1804) or the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours (1831), whose proud building we can still admire today at Picadilly in London. De Wint was a member of the older of these two watercolourists’ societies.

The present watercolour is dominated by the tower of St. Mary’s Church in Lambeth, near the eponymous palace that had served as the London residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury since the 13th century. Today, a more modern nave belongs to the 14th-century belfry, which was only completed shortly after de Wint’s death. In the scene’s foreground, barks bob up and down on the quiet waters of the Thames.