Collector, Dealer, Connoisseur: The Vision of Richard L. Feigen
Collector, Dealer, Connoisseur: The Vision of Richard L. Feigen
Sir David Wilkie, R.A.
Sketch for "A Whisky Still at Lochgilphead"
Auction Closed
October 18, 03:29 PM GMT
Estimate
20,000 - 30,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
Sir David Wilkie, R.A.
Fifie 1785 - 1841 at sea off Gibraltar
Sketch for "A Whisky Still at Lochgilphead"
signed and dated on the reverse: D. Wilkie 1817
oil on panel
panel: 5 5/8 by 8 1/8 in.; 14.2 by 20.6 cm.
framed: 11 by 13 in.; 27.9 by 33 cm.
Thence by descent to his son, Sir William Wellesley Knighton, 2nd Baronet of Carlston (1811-1885);
By whom anonymously sold, London, Christie's, 26 June 1847, lot 73 (where unsold);
Anonymous sale, London, Christie's, 4 March 1848, lot 134;
There acquired by Colonel James Lenox, New York;
Bequeathed to the New York Public Library;
By whom anonymously sold, New York, Parke-Bernet Galleries, 24 May 1944, lot 121 (as a group lot);
With the Renaissance Galleries, New York;
Roy Thomson;
Anonymous sale ("Property of a Gentleman"), London, Christie's, 22 March 1968, lot 136;
There acquired by Spink & Son, London;
Anonymous sale ("Property of a Deceased Estate"), London, Sotheby's, 13 November, 1991, lot 89;
There acquired by Richard L. Feigen.
Catalogue of paintings in the Picture Gallery, New York Public Library, New York 1911, cat. no. 21;
H. Miles, Fourteen Small Pictures by Wilkie, exhibition catalogue, London 1981, under note to plate 13.
London, Richard L. Feigen & Co., Sir David Wilkie 1785-1841, 13 October - 25 November 1994, no. 15.
David Wilkie painted this sketch while on a trip to the Highlands in 1817 to visit his friend John MacNeill. In a letter to his brother, Wilkie described the experience in colorful detail: "Mr. Macneill of Oakfield has got me a whisky-still to make a study from...a legalised one, an excellent one, very small, and the house where it is very picturesque. The man who keeps the still can not speak English, and the only interpreter I had was a breekless halfin who attended me to carry colours."1 MacNeill went to great lengths to show Wilkie the local people, their homes and, most interesting to the artist, a licensed whisky-still near Oakfield. The vibrant brushwork, hues of brown and subtle attention to the two figures bring to life Wilkie's written account. He made this sketch along with two others of the same subject, which he brought back with him to London. Two years later, he developed the present sketch into a finished painting, today found in a private collection.
This sketch is said to have been in the collection of Sir William Knighton (1776-1836), a physician who later became Private Secretary and Keeper of the Privy Purse to George IV. Knighton was a confidant of the King and was used on many secret missions. An important patron of Wilkie, Knighton was a discerning connoisseur who collected notable contemporary artists. The sketch sold twice at Christie's between 1847-48 after Knighton's death and was bought in the second sale by Colonel James Lenox, an American collector and the founder of the New York Public Library, to where it was bequeathed after his death.
This work is to be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the paintings of David Wilkie.
1. Cunningham 1843, pp. 472-76.