Alfred Sisley

M. Picq-Véron, Ermont-Eaubonne
Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris (acquired from the above on 25th June 1892)
Durand-Ruel Gallery, New York (acquired from the above on 23th November 1892)
A. W. Kingman, New York (acquired from the above on 20th January 1894)
Galerie Durand-Ruel, Paris (acquired from the above on 5th March 1896)
Arthur Tooth & Sons, London (acquired from the above by 1938)
The 1st Viscount Radcliffe, Hampton Lucy, Warwickshire (acquired from the above on 14th November 1938)
John E. Fattorini, Bradford (acquired by 1941)
Arthur Tooth & Sons, London (acquired from the above)
Captain Edward Molyneux, London (acquired from the above on 11th December 1942)
Arthur Tooth & Sons, London (acquired from the above)
The 9th Earl of Jersey, Jersey (acquired from the above on 27th October 1945)
Thence by descent to the present owners

New York, Durand-Ruel Gallery, Exposition, Works by Alfred Sisley, 1899, no. 20 (titled La Serpentine à Londres)
Saint-Louis, Universal Exposition, 1904, Department B: Art, no. 521 (titled Landscape)
New York, Durand-Ruel Gallery, Exhibition of Paintings by Alfred Sisley, 1905, no. 7 (titled Serpentine à Londres)
Boston, Walter Kimball, Paintings by Alfred Sisley from the Durand-Ruel Collection, 1908, no. 3 (titled La Serpentine à Londres)
New York, Durand-Ruel Gallery, Exhibition of Paintings by Sisley, 1912, no. 4 (titled La Serpentine à Londres)
New York, Durand-Ruel Gallery, Exhibition of Paintings by Alfred Sisley, 1927, no. 4 (titled La Serpentine à Londres)
London, National Gallery, 19th Century French Paintings, 1942, no. 55
St. Helier, Jersey Museum and Art Gallery, Barreau Art Gallery, Old Masters from Jersey Collections, 1952, no. 44
Cardiff, National Museum of Wales, How Impressionism Began, 1960, no. 47
London, Hayward Gallery, The Impressionists in London, 1973, no. 40, illustrated in the catalogue
St. Helier, La Société Jersiaise, Centenary Art Exhibition, 1973, no. 5
Tokyo, Isetan Museum of Art; Fukuoka, Fukuoka Art Museum & Nara, Nara Prefectural Museum, Retrospective A. Sisley, 1985, no. 15, illustrated in colour in the catalogue
Treviso, Casa dei Carraresi, L'impressionismo e l'età di Van Gogh, 2002-03, no. 7, illustrated in colour in the catalogue

François Daulte, Alfred Sisley, Catalogue raisonné de l’œuvre peint, Paris, 1959, no. 117, illustrated
Alfred Sisley (exhibition catalogue), Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1992, mentioned p. 136
Richard Shone, Sisley, London, 1992, no. 46, illustrated in colour p. 78
Sisley in England and Wales (exhibition catalogue), National Gallery, London, 2008, mentioned p. 20
Nicholas Reed, Sisley on the Thames and the Welsh Coast, Folkestone, 2008, illustrated in colour p. 35

The canvas is unlined, with a loose, unattached dust canvas. Apart from a few tiny spots of retouching in the sky and and some minor retouchings along the upper turnover edge (which are mostly covered by the frame), visible under ultra-violet light, this work is in very good condition. Colours: Overall fairly accurate in the printed catalogue illustration, although the greens are more pronounced in the original, particularly on the left.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
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."

In the summer of 1874 Alfred Sisley travelled to his native England and created some of his finest early paintings, exemplified by La Tamise avec Hampton Church. The artist had been invited to London by the famous baritone Jean-Baptist Faure, of the Opéra-Comique, who was a keen collector of Impressionist pictures. François Daulte commented that the artist ‘produced some of his freest, freshest and most untrammelled work during this trip to the capital of the British Isles’ (quoted in Vivienne Couldrey, Alfred Sisley: The English Impressionist, London, 1992, p. 59). Sisley did not remain long in London itself, moving further down the river Thames to Hampton Court soon after his arrival, and remained there until late October. Vivienne Couldrey suggests that Sisley was attracted to Hampton by the prospect of similar river scenes he had enjoyed on the Seine in France: ‘full of leisure and pleasure of a Sunday afternoon boating on the river, fishing, and strolling along the tow-path. Hampton Court was then a popular place for a weekend outing from the city, to enjoy the freedom of the green fields and the open air, in the same way that Parisians headed for Grenouillère and Argenteuil’ (ibid., p. 60).

The artist had spent time in England in his youth. His father, Walter Sisley, wished his son to follow him into commerce and arranged for him to train in England in 1857. He studied for three years until he found himself more inclined towards art and returned to Paris in 1861. Following Faure’s invitation, Sisley’s return to England led him to embark on a group of paintings that were the most ambitious he had attempted to date. Kenneth Clark commented: ‘I doubt if any picture could be much truer to a visual impression, with all its implications of light and tone, than the Sisley paintings of Hampton Court, 1874’ and that they were ‘the perfect moment of Impressionism’ (quoted in ibid., p. 7).

Sisley’s views of Hampton Court concentrated on a few select motifs, such as the regatta (fig. 1), the bridge or the towpath (fig. 2). The present work depicts a riverside panorama, in which the artist has paid particular attention to the relationship between the configuration of light in the sky, on the river and its banks. La Tamise avec Hampton Church reveals Sisley’s masterful command of colour, especially evident in the contrast between the cool verdant tones depicting the trees and the sun-bleached ochre of the towpath. This evocative interplay of light is further complemented by the glinting river and expansive blue-hued sky. The iconography in Sisley’s Hampton Court scenes focuses on bourgeois leisure, the smartly dressed man with his cane personifying the understated elegance of an idyllic afternoon spent away from the bustle of London on the banks of the Thames.

Discussing the importance of the Hampton Court paintings Christopher Riopelle writes: ‘The works executed in the summer of 1874 show Sisley expanding both his powers of perception and execution. As he worked, the artist must also have thought about his own Englishness and the contrasting French side of his character. […] Inevitably, England became associated in his memory with a distant summer and early autumn spent on the western fringes of London when, under the English sun, a new creativity and thrilling sense of innovation entered his art’ (C. Riopelle in 19th Century French Paintings (exhibition catalogue), op. cit., pp. 25-26). In total Sisley executed seventeen views of England during his 1874 visit, more than half of which are now in museums and important collections, including the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, the National Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh, the Bayerische Staatsgemäldesammlungen, Pinakothek der Moderne in Munich, and the Kunstmusuem in Wintherthur.