Lot Essay
We are grateful to Professor R.D. Keynes who confirmed the attribution in a letter dated 5 October 1993. Professor Keynes has pointed out that the palms and exotic plants have affinities with his work in Tahiti and may be developments of drawings made when he visited Tahiti in January and February 1835. The landscape and figures however appear more likely to be recollections of Rio de Janeiro and its environs, where Martens stayed briefly in July 1833 before joining the Beagle at Montevideo in November 1833. Martens left the Beagle in August 1834 at Valparaiso and embarked on the Peruvian in December 1834 for Tahiti where he stayed for two months before taking the Black Warrior to Sydney.