Richard Parkes Bonington

Sale, London, Sotheby's, 8 April 1998, lot 125 (bt Spink-Leger),

with Spink Leger, London,

where acquired by the present owner

P. Noon, Richard Parkes Bonington, the complete paintings, New Haven 2008, p. 87, no. 13

This rare watercolor, which sees fisherman securing their boats, while heavy storm-clouds roll in from the horizon, dates to circa 1820, the year that Bonington’s chosen sheet of ‘Whatman’ paper is watermarked.

Bonington turned eighteen in 1820 and, having benefited from the tuition of François Louis Thomas Francia (1772-1839) while living in Calais in 1817-1818, had by this time established himself in Paris and enrolled at the École des Beaux-Art. The present watercolor is one of a number that he painted on such a jewel-like scale at around this time, presumably created to take advantage of the then fashion, amongst the bourgeoisie and aristocracy, for assembling portfolios of prints and drawings. For another example of Bonington working on this scale see: Small Vessel in a Choppy Sea (Musée du Louvre, Paris).¹

Bonington died tragically young, aged only 27, but left an indelible mark on both the French and British schools. His friend Eugène Delacroix wrote, for example: 'to my mind… no one in this modern school, and perhaps even before, has possessed that lightness of touch which… makes his works a type of diamond that flatters and ravishes the eye.'²

^1.P. Noon, op. cit, p. 85, no. 8 

^2.Letter to Théophile Thoré in 1861.