Arthur John Elsley

Dorothy Kilgallen Kollmar and Richard T. Kollmar, New York (and sold: Parke-Bernet, New York, January 12, 1967, lot 89)
Private Collection, New York (acquired at the above sale)
Thence by descent to the present owner

Terry Parker, Golden Hours, The Paintings of Arthur J. Elsley 1860-1952, Somerset, England, 1998, pp. 71 and 97

After leaving the Royal Academy schools, Arthur J. Elsley made a living by painting portrait commissions of human, equestrian, and canine subjects.  In 1889, he joined the studio of established artist, and leading exponent of childhood imagery, Fred Morgan (1847-1927).  Morgan believed in the old adage every picture tells a story.  Elsley now turned his portraiture skills to successful story telling.  He began by painting single children with a pet or pets (see lot 193) and with success he slowly increased the number of children and animals.

 

At the turn of the century, Elsley set up studio at his new home on 26 Queen’s Grove, St. John’s Wood, London.  Here he had the space to work on more ambitious compositions.  In 1902, the year of the coronation of King Edward VII, Elsley embarked on a series of twelve, multi-figure paintings of children playing in gardens of grand country houses.  The first of this series was Spring Songs/Baby’s Birthday (1902) (sold: Sotheby’s, New York, October 24, 2006, lot 101).  Other paintings in the series were I Sent a Letter to My Love (1902), Golden Hours (1903), The Home Team (1903), The Happy Pair/A Royal Procession (1904), Baby’s Turn/A Skipping Match (1905), Try Again (1906), Not Caught Yet (1906), Love at First Sight (1907), Here They Are (1907), The First Love Letter (1908), and Jump Up/Take Me Too (1908).

 

Elsley, born and bred a Londoner, would have seen numerous royal processions in the capital city.  Towards the end of her reign, the aging Queen Victoria was less able to take part in parades.  The pomp and circumstance of the Coronation of her son, King Edward VII, captivated an empire.  On August 2, 1902, King Edward, together with his wife Princess Alexandra (the Princess Diana of her day), travelled in an open carriage from Buckingham Palace to his Coronation in Westminster Abbey.  This together with the parade for the royal opening of Parliament, and the annual Lord Mayor of London Show would have been very much in the public’s mind.  Children love to play act and a royal procession was an ideal scene for fun and enjoyment.

 

A small head and shoulders oil sketch of the lead girl was sold at the artist’s studio sale, Sotheby’s, Billingshurst, Sussex, October 1, 1989 (part of lot 22).  It was reproduced as one of a series of six Elsley postcards published by Raphael Tuck in 1904.

Elsley owned a collie and frequently included one in his works.  He took the settings, architectural features and garden furnishings (walls, balustrades, fences, steps, benches and urns) from numerous photographs of grand country houses featured in Country Life.  The artist kept, for reference purposes, a large collection of bound volumes of this magazine.  There is no record of Elsley exhibiting this painting, in fact he didn’t exhibit at the Royal Academy in 1904.  He had no need to; he was so much in demand, with print companies queuing up to buy his latest work.

 

The date below the signature now reads 1894.  The painting certainly isn’t this date stylistically, and both print versions reproduce the date as 1904.  The painting already bore the earlier date when it was last on the market in 1967.  Most likely at some point in the painting’s history, the “9” and the “0” of the original were abraded, and the restorer thought them “8” and “9” – a very simple mistake.