Collector, Dealer, Connoisseur: The Vision of Richard L. Feigen
Collector, Dealer, Connoisseur: The Vision of Richard L. Feigen
Richard Parkes Bonington
The Remonstrance: An old woman admonishing two children
Auction Closed
October 18, 03:29 PM GMT
Estimate
10,000 - 15,000 USD
Lot Details
Description
Richard Parkes Bonington
Arnold 1801 - 1828 London
The Remonstrance: An old woman admonishing two children
watercolor over pencil, heightened with gouache and gum arabic
sheet: 3 by 5 1/2 in.; 7.6 by 13.8 cm.
framed: 11 1/4 by 13 in.; 28.5 by 33 cm.
By whom sold, Paris, 19 December 1846, lot 47 (as La Remonstrance);
With Paterson Gallery, London, 1913;
W.C. Alexander (1840-1916), and by descent;
By whom sold, New York, Sotheby's, 25 January 2017, lot 111;
There acquired by Richard L. Feigen.
P. Noon, "Bonington (1802-1828): Un romantique Anglais au Louvre," in La revue du Louvre et des musées de France 43, no. 4 (October 1994), p. 62;
P. Noon, Richard Parkes Bonington, The Complete Paintings, New Haven and London 2008, p. 394, cat. no. 361, reproduced in color.
New Haven, Yale Center for British Art; Paris, Petit Palais, Richard Parkes Bonington, On the Pleasure of Painting, 13 November 1991 - 17 May 1992, no. 107.
This jewel-like watercolor, which has been dated to circa 1826, is a particularly radiant example of Bonington’s figure painting – a genre that greatly interested him during the last years of his short life. Inspired by Dutch 17th century painting, Bonington has created an atmospheric interior of deep shadows, half-lights and, in places, intense luminosity.
The work is a preparatory sketch for a now lost watercolor which was engraved, under the title The Grandmother, in 1833. The identity of the three figures is unknown, however they each re-appear in other works by Bonington. The children can be found in the lithograph Les Plaisirs Paternels,1 while the old lady is included in his watercolor The Use of Tears.2
1. M. Spencer, R.P. Bonington 1802-1828, 1965, p. 121.
2. Paris, Musée du Louvre, inv. no. RF 22756.