Henry Wallis

Signed with initials and dated l.r.: H. W. / 1854 PROVENANCE Lifford Antiques; Sotheby's, London, 27 March 1973, lot 47 where bought by J. S. Maas on behalf of Sir David Scott. EXHIBITED London, Royal Academy of Arts, 1854, no. 176; Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland, Sunshine & Shadow - The David Scott Collection of Victorian Paintings, 1991, no. 7. LITERATURE AND REFERENCES Art Journal, 1854, p.161; Sotheby's, Pictures from the Collection of Sir David and Lady Scott, 2008, pp. 92-93. CATALOGUE NOTE Henry Wallis' subject, showing the impoverished Dr Johnson being given an impromptu meal when visiting his publisher Edward Cave, was inspired by a note by Edward Malone in the third edition of Boswell's Life of Johnson, published in 1799. This describes how Johnson was living a hand-to-mouth existence in the period before he gained a professional reputation. Wallis shows him as prematurely aged (he was only in his mid-thirties at this time), and with worn and badly repaired clothes. He peers myopically (he had poor eyesight as a result of contracting scrofula as a child) at the writing slope at which he works, and appears not to be happy to be interrupted by the arrival of the young servant who brings food to him. The visit to Edward Cave in fact represented a turning-point in Johnson's career, because it was from Cave that he received the commission to write a series of pieces for the Gentleman's Magazine, of which Cave was the founder and proprietor. The esteem in which these articles were held eventually led to Johnson becoming one of the most eminent literary figures of the day. Among them was his poem 'London', of 1738, in which he described his friend the poet Richard Savage's miserable life in the city and their nocturnal ramblings together. This was followed by his Life of Mr Richard Savage (1744), one of the seminal works of biography in the English language. His Debates in The Senate of Lilliput - a commentary on contemporary parliamentary debate, also appeared in Cave's periodical. Johnson's work as a writer is alluded to in the painting: the paper lying beside the inkwell is inscribed 'For June 1744 / Debates' and 'Lilliput', while the paper upon which the red bound book is placed is marked 'Savage'. The pattern of Henry Wallis's training as an artist was slightly unusual in that he studied for a period in Paris, in the atelier of the painter Gleyres and also at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. He first exhibited in public in Manchester in 1853, and then showed the present painting at the Royal Academy in 1854, the first of thirty-five of his works to be shown there up until 1877. He remained a figure on the Pre-Raphaelite fringe until the early 1860s. He was a member of the Hogarth Club which may be regarded as indicating that he was part of the progressive movement in painting that led forward from Pre-Raphaelitism to the Aesthetic Movement. However, he apparently inherited a considerable property in 1859, a factor which perhaps allowed him to be less ambitious about his professional career. Certainly the works that he showed in later years are much less interesting than those of the 1850s. In later years, Wallis devoted much of his energy and resources to studying and collecting ceramics. The colour and texture of the present work, and the careful observation of detail (when showing the painting to friends, Sir David used to point out the red marks on the arms of the servant, which he believed were burns from a hot oven), identify Wallis as one who was influenced by contemporary Pre-Raphaelitism. The work was not approved of by the critic of the Art Journal, who condemned it as a 'subject [...] unsuited to Art and [one that] ought not to have been painted'. It was, however, the prototype of the most remarkable painting of Wallis's early career, and the work for which he is now remembered, The Death of Chatterton (Tate), and which showed the suicide of the young poet in a garret bedroom. This was accompanied at the 1856 Royal Academy by another literary subject, Andrew Marvell Returning the Bribe (whereabouts unknown). Dr Johnson was an admired figure of English literature in the mid-nineteenth century. In 1860 Dante Gabriel Rossetti made a pen and ink drawing of Dr Johnson at the Mitre, illustrating a passage from Boswell's Life of Johnson (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge).

together 2 vol. in 1, out-of-series copies from editions limited to 200, titles in red and black with pictorial border, 30 and 12 chromolithographed plates respectively, illustrations, a little foxed, some very light marginal water-staining to a few leaves, contemporary morocco, t.e.g., others uncut, a little rubbed and stained, 4to, 1898-1900.

footnote: the present work depicts mary ellen meredith (1821-61), the daughter of the poet and novelist thomas love peacock and the lover of henry wallis for several years. mary ellen was an adept writer; she was witty, intellectual and free-spirited. she married the writer george meredith in 1849 and together they had a son arthur. among the merediths' many literary friends was henry wallis. wallis asked george to model for his most famous picture

HENRY WALLIS, RWS, SIGNED, WATERCOLOUR, Young Girls Picking Flowers, 6” x 9 ½”

HENRY WALLIS, RWS (1830-1916, BRITISH) Signed Watercolour Young Girls Picking Flowers 6” x 9 ½”