William Powell Frith, R.A. 1819-1909

STRUCTURE This picture is relined and in very good condition. CATALOGUE COMPARISON The illustration is broadly representative PAINT SURFACE The surface is sound with bright colouring and fine detail throughout. The paint surface appears to be stable and there are no signs of craquelure. The picture is clean and ready to hang. UNDER ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT There are a few very minor flecked retouchings. FRAME This picture is contained in a Victorian moulded plaster frame.
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NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

This fascinating oil study is probably the sketch shown by Frith to the art dealer Gambart following the success of Frith's painting The Marriage of the Prince of Wales (Royal Collection) in 1865. Gambart had grown tired of Frith's work upon the Times of the Day series of pictures and hoped that his visit would find the artist working on something of substance for sale. Frith explained that he had found the subject for the sketch in the diaries of John Evelyn, who had written shortly after seeing King Charles one Sunday evening at the Great Hall of Whitehall; 'I can never forget the inexpressible luxury and profaneness, gaming and all dissoluteness, and... total forgetfulness of God (it being Sunday evening)' (Christopher Wood, William Powell Frith, A Painter and his World, 2006, p. 139) Gambart recognised that the subject was a commercial one and commissioned Frith to paint a large version of the subject for a fee of £3,000. The finished painting of The Last Sunday of Charles II was bought by the brewer Charles Peter Matthews (1819-1891) for his home Bower House in Essex. The finished painting was sold in these rooms (22 November 1967, lot 71).

The present sketch differs in details to the finished version of the subject, with almost all of the figures posed slightly differently. The model that posed for the figure of King Charles, chosen for his uncanny resemblance to the king, was in poor health when he posed for the painting and died little more than a week following the completion of the painting.