.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
This fine watercolour, in its handsome original frame, is a worthy sequel to The Child Miranda, Burton's enchanting study of 1864 which was sold in these Rooms on 11 November 1999 for the record price of £265,500. The Wife of Hassan Aga is two years earlier, being exhibited at the Old Water-Colour Society in 1862 with another oriental figure entitled Yelitza. They were much admired by the critics. 'We have to congratulate Mr Burton', wrote Tom Taylor in the Times, 'on two drawings...in which he has gone beyond anything yet seen in watercolour art for force and brilliancy of colour'. Having described the subjects, he made the same point more fully. 'The beauty of the drawing is consummate, but what arrests most attention is the extraordinary brilliancy and force of the colour, for which no head we have ever seen in watercolour, and very few in oil, can stand beside these most remarkable drawings'.
F.G. Stephens, a member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood who had abandoned painting for art-criticism and recently joined the staff of the Athenaeum, was equally enthusiastic. Burton's pictures, he wrote, were 'admirable for solidity and character...The Wife of Hassan Aga, seated at a window with a face full of sorrow and fear, [is] a work admirable for intensity of expression, brilliant colour and force of tone. In this picture Mr Burton has equalled oil in vigour of execution; the picture will surprise even those who remember his previous works'. The art critic on the Illustrated London News was yet another who was struck by Burton's ability to give watercolour the density and richness of oil. 'Of the few figure subjects [in the exhibition], none leave a deeper impression than two large Oriental studies by Mr Burton...These heads have a force scarcely inferior to the finest paintings in oil. The modelling, the strength of effect, the powerful tone, and rich variety of colour, deserve the very highest praise'.
Frederic Burton was born on 8 April 1816 at Clifden House, Corofin, in Co. Clare, Ireland. The Burtons could trace their lineage back to the fifteenth century, and Frederic's father, Samuel Frederic Burton, was an amateur landscape painter of independent means. In 1826 the family moved to Dublin, where Frederic received some artistic training from the Brocas brothers and the landscape painter and antiquary George Petrie. His dual interest in the practice of art and art-historical scholarship would seem to owe much to the influence of Petrie, who remained a lifelong friend. By 1837, when he was still only twenty-one, he had made such artistic progress that he was elected an associate of the Royal Hibernian Academy, graduating to full membership two years later. His handsome features, keen intelligence and natural distinction of manner gave him ready access to Dublin society and local intellectual circles. Many sat to him for portraits and miniatures, although his best-known early portraits were two likenesses of the English actress Helen Faucit, exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1849. Meanwhile he was experimenting with landscape, historical subjects, and genre. Some of his genre scenes, such as The Aran Fisherman's Drowned Child and A Connaught Toilet, became well known through engravings; another notable example, The Blind Girl at the Holy Well, shown at the R.H.A. in 1840, was sold at Christie's in London on 10 March 1995 (lot 148A). All this early work was in watercolour, which remained his favourite medium.
Contact with Dublin's intelligensia developed Burton's historical sense, and in 1851 he settled in Munich to begin a six-year study of German art. He continued to paint, taking his subjects from the lives of the local peasantry and developing a style which led critics to compare him to Van Eyck, Memling, Holbein, and other early Flemish and German masters.
On his return to Britain, Burton settled in London. He had exhibited at the Royal Academy since 1842, and in 1855 he was elected an associate of the Old Water-Colour Society, proceeding to full membership the following year. From the 1840s he seems to have felt the influence of Ruskin; witness the detailed naturalism of his portrait of Annie Callwell or the study of a pine-stump in the Tyrol, both in the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. Now he came into personal contact with the Pre-Raphaelite circle, and this too left its mark. The outstanding example is Hellelil and Hildebrand: The Meeting on the Turret Stairs (National Gallery of Ireland), a subject inspired by a Norse ballad that he exhibited at the Old Water-Colour Society in 1864. Rossettian in its medieval theme and emotional intensity, the picture also shows awareness of Millais' paintings of star-crossed lovers, such as A Huguenot (1852; private collection) and The Black Brunswicker (1860; Port Sunlight). However, the artist to whom Burton was personally closest was Edward Burne-Jones, his junior by seventeen years but a man who shared his scholarly approach to painting and art-historical interests. When Burne-Jones resigned from the Old Water-Colour Society in 1870 after objections were raised to the nudity of one of his figures, Burton withdrew in sympathy and refused to reconsider his decision.
Throughout these years, Burton maintained his scholarly interests, which embraced not only the history of European painting but literature, music, and anything to do with Irish antiquities. He was involved with a number of organisations promoting research on these subjects, helping to found the Archaeological Society of Ireland and becoming a member of the London Society of Antiquaries in 1863. In 1874 his art-historical eminence was recognised when he was appointed Director of the National Gallery in London. It was usual at the time for the post to be held by an artist of scholarly inclinations. Burton succeeded Sir William Boxall, who in turn had succeeded Eastlake, and he himself was to be followed by Poynter in 1894. During his twenty-year regime, Burton's knowledge and connoisseurship were to be fully deployed. The Gallery not only acquired no fewer than 450 pictures, including some of its most familiar and best-loved masterpieces, but progress was made on the arrangement, classification and cataloguing of the collection. Burton devoted himself to the task, abandoning his brushes entirely, nor did he return to the practice of painting on his retirement. He was knighted in 1884, and given the degree of LL.D. of Trinity College, Dublin, in 1896. Although his later career had unfolded in London, where he died, unmarried, in 1900, Ireland never lost its place in his affections, and he was buried beside his parents in Mount Jerome cemetery, Dublin.
Like Hellelil and Hildebrand and The Child Miranda, The Wife of Hassan Aga reflects Burton's connection with the Pre-Raphaelites. Half-length female figures were common in Rossetti's work from the late 1850s, as well as being attempted by Burne-Jones and others who felt Rossetti's powerful influence. As for the subject of Burton's picture, this has not yet been identified; but it may well derive from Lane's edition of the Arabian Nights, for which there was a vogue in Pre-Raphaelite circles at this date. Rossetti's Golden Water: The Princess Parisadé (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge), a watercolour of 1858, has this literary source, and would almost certainly have been known to Burton.
Burton's study for his figure's arms, executed in pencil, black chalk and watercolour on brown paper, is in the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. It was exhibited there with the finished picture in 1997.
C.J. Leaf of Tunbridge Wells, who owned the picture prior to its sale in 1904, and a good collection of modern British watercolours, including examples of George Cattermole, Birket Foster, G.A. Fripp, Carl Haag, William ('birdnest') Hunt, and Robert Thorne Waite. The Wife of Hassan Aga was his only work by Burton.
F.G. Stephens, a member of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood who had abandoned painting for art-criticism and recently joined the staff of the Athenaeum, was equally enthusiastic. Burton's pictures, he wrote, were 'admirable for solidity and character...The Wife of Hassan Aga, seated at a window with a face full of sorrow and fear, [is] a work admirable for intensity of expression, brilliant colour and force of tone. In this picture Mr Burton has equalled oil in vigour of execution; the picture will surprise even those who remember his previous works'. The art critic on the Illustrated London News was yet another who was struck by Burton's ability to give watercolour the density and richness of oil. 'Of the few figure subjects [in the exhibition], none leave a deeper impression than two large Oriental studies by Mr Burton...These heads have a force scarcely inferior to the finest paintings in oil. The modelling, the strength of effect, the powerful tone, and rich variety of colour, deserve the very highest praise'.
Frederic Burton was born on 8 April 1816 at Clifden House, Corofin, in Co. Clare, Ireland. The Burtons could trace their lineage back to the fifteenth century, and Frederic's father, Samuel Frederic Burton, was an amateur landscape painter of independent means. In 1826 the family moved to Dublin, where Frederic received some artistic training from the Brocas brothers and the landscape painter and antiquary George Petrie. His dual interest in the practice of art and art-historical scholarship would seem to owe much to the influence of Petrie, who remained a lifelong friend. By 1837, when he was still only twenty-one, he had made such artistic progress that he was elected an associate of the Royal Hibernian Academy, graduating to full membership two years later. His handsome features, keen intelligence and natural distinction of manner gave him ready access to Dublin society and local intellectual circles. Many sat to him for portraits and miniatures, although his best-known early portraits were two likenesses of the English actress Helen Faucit, exhibited at the Royal Academy in London in 1849. Meanwhile he was experimenting with landscape, historical subjects, and genre. Some of his genre scenes, such as The Aran Fisherman's Drowned Child and A Connaught Toilet, became well known through engravings; another notable example, The Blind Girl at the Holy Well, shown at the R.H.A. in 1840, was sold at Christie's in London on 10 March 1995 (lot 148A). All this early work was in watercolour, which remained his favourite medium.
Contact with Dublin's intelligensia developed Burton's historical sense, and in 1851 he settled in Munich to begin a six-year study of German art. He continued to paint, taking his subjects from the lives of the local peasantry and developing a style which led critics to compare him to Van Eyck, Memling, Holbein, and other early Flemish and German masters.
On his return to Britain, Burton settled in London. He had exhibited at the Royal Academy since 1842, and in 1855 he was elected an associate of the Old Water-Colour Society, proceeding to full membership the following year. From the 1840s he seems to have felt the influence of Ruskin; witness the detailed naturalism of his portrait of Annie Callwell or the study of a pine-stump in the Tyrol, both in the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. Now he came into personal contact with the Pre-Raphaelite circle, and this too left its mark. The outstanding example is Hellelil and Hildebrand: The Meeting on the Turret Stairs (National Gallery of Ireland), a subject inspired by a Norse ballad that he exhibited at the Old Water-Colour Society in 1864. Rossettian in its medieval theme and emotional intensity, the picture also shows awareness of Millais' paintings of star-crossed lovers, such as A Huguenot (1852; private collection) and The Black Brunswicker (1860; Port Sunlight). However, the artist to whom Burton was personally closest was Edward Burne-Jones, his junior by seventeen years but a man who shared his scholarly approach to painting and art-historical interests. When Burne-Jones resigned from the Old Water-Colour Society in 1870 after objections were raised to the nudity of one of his figures, Burton withdrew in sympathy and refused to reconsider his decision.
Throughout these years, Burton maintained his scholarly interests, which embraced not only the history of European painting but literature, music, and anything to do with Irish antiquities. He was involved with a number of organisations promoting research on these subjects, helping to found the Archaeological Society of Ireland and becoming a member of the London Society of Antiquaries in 1863. In 1874 his art-historical eminence was recognised when he was appointed Director of the National Gallery in London. It was usual at the time for the post to be held by an artist of scholarly inclinations. Burton succeeded Sir William Boxall, who in turn had succeeded Eastlake, and he himself was to be followed by Poynter in 1894. During his twenty-year regime, Burton's knowledge and connoisseurship were to be fully deployed. The Gallery not only acquired no fewer than 450 pictures, including some of its most familiar and best-loved masterpieces, but progress was made on the arrangement, classification and cataloguing of the collection. Burton devoted himself to the task, abandoning his brushes entirely, nor did he return to the practice of painting on his retirement. He was knighted in 1884, and given the degree of LL.D. of Trinity College, Dublin, in 1896. Although his later career had unfolded in London, where he died, unmarried, in 1900, Ireland never lost its place in his affections, and he was buried beside his parents in Mount Jerome cemetery, Dublin.
Like Hellelil and Hildebrand and The Child Miranda, The Wife of Hassan Aga reflects Burton's connection with the Pre-Raphaelites. Half-length female figures were common in Rossetti's work from the late 1850s, as well as being attempted by Burne-Jones and others who felt Rossetti's powerful influence. As for the subject of Burton's picture, this has not yet been identified; but it may well derive from Lane's edition of the Arabian Nights, for which there was a vogue in Pre-Raphaelite circles at this date. Rossetti's Golden Water: The Princess Parisadé (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge), a watercolour of 1858, has this literary source, and would almost certainly have been known to Burton.
Burton's study for his figure's arms, executed in pencil, black chalk and watercolour on brown paper, is in the National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin. It was exhibited there with the finished picture in 1997.
C.J. Leaf of Tunbridge Wells, who owned the picture prior to its sale in 1904, and a good collection of modern British watercolours, including examples of George Cattermole, Birket Foster, G.A. Fripp, Carl Haag, William ('birdnest') Hunt, and Robert Thorne Waite. The Wife of Hassan Aga was his only work by Burton.