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THE COLLECTION OF WILLIAM AND MILDRED ARCHER Lots 1-70 When I opened my first gallery in Duke Street, with Julian Hartnoll, in 1968, among our very first visitors were William and Mildred Archer - Bill and Tim to their friends. Bill had just retired as Keeper Emeritus of the Indian department of the Victoria and Albert Museum. There he had been responsible for the reorganisation of that formidable collection after the war and the cataloguing of the collection of Pahari miniatures. Tim was in charge of the Prints and Drawings department of the India Office Library. She was just completing her catalogue of 'British Drawings in the India Office Library' and at the same time preparing her catalogue of Company paintings to be published four years later. Soon after their visit I was invited to dinner at their charming house in Provost Road. It was to be the first of many such evenings. During these we spent many hours, long into the night, discussing the tricky problems of attribution and the diverse merits of the various British artists to work in India during the period from 1770 to 1857. At the time, despite the pioneering work of Sir Evan Cotton in Calcutta and Sir William Foster in London, the study of the principal portrait and landscape painters who worked in oils in India was still in infancy and the subject of much controversy. Tim's most important contribution to this study was India and British Portraiture 1770-1825 published in 1979. In the fifteen years before Indian Independence, Bill had served in the Indian Civil Service. During this period he developed a passion for Indian art and made a collection of fine Pahari paintings. But it was not until the early 1960s that he, fully supported by Tim, began to put together the following remarkable collection of paintings, drawings and prints, by European artists working in India. Together they sought out for their collection the very best examples by the principal painters to visit the subcontinent. Of all these, Thomas and William Daniell have now captured the imagination of the present age. Partly this is a result of the publication of Oriental Scenery but also for their elegant paintings and drawings done during or after their intrepid journeys through India. I was involved in the purchase of only one important work for this collection - Thomas Daniell's sublime landscape of 'Augustus Cleveland's house at Bhagalpore' (lot 4) done on the spot in 1790. It is characterised by an intense feeling both for the subtle beauty of the landscape but also in his rendering of Indian figures. A few years later Tim acquired from the P. & O. Collection an important watercolour of 'The Barna Temple at Benares' (lot 5) by the same artist. It shows the great sweep of the Ganges flanked by this ancient and holy city. In 1790 the occupant of Cleveland's palladian house was Samuel Davis, himself one of the most accomplished artists of Indian landscape. It has long been presumed that he was trained as a watercolour painter by Thomas Daniell but evidence has come to light that he had travelled out to India on a Portuguese ship with William Hodges and that his early training came from this most underrated artist. Davis' watercolours have much the same sensitivity and romantic overtones that we associate with Hodges' work. Most of Davis' surviving works are in the Victoria Memorial in Calcutta and as a result few ever come on the market. The Archers' watercolour by him 'The Kotwali Gate at Gaur' (lot 24) is certainly the finest ever to be offered at auction. It encapsulates the essence of the enquiring mind of the late 18th century traveller in India. We know surprisingly little about an elusive artist of perhaps the rarest watercolour in this collection --'Representation of the Dancing Girls, on the Coast of Coromandel'. Fortunately for us it is signed 'C Green del'. He is presumed to be a certain Colonel Green working in Calcutta from about 1770 to 1790. Apart from ten drawings by him in the Royal Collection and the present example, just two others are known to students. The Archers' drawing is certainly the most ambitious of these. Green would appear to be the earliest of a small group of British artists working in Calcutta with a profound interest in Indian life, and whose focus lay in the precise deliniation of Indian characters. Other rarities include Longcroft's surprisingly modern monochrome study of trees in the Sal Forest of Rohilcund (lot 32) and a delightful unfinished sketch by Ezekiel Barton - a painter of great originality. Another highly gifted artist, Robert Smith, painted Indian subjects throughout his long life, but sadly as much as ninety percent of his work is missing. In 1979, Spink offered for sale Ezekiel Barton's personal album that contained not only his work but also that of some of his contemporaries, including two watercolours by Smith. Bill and Tim acquired one of these 'A View of the Hill Fort of Rohtasgarh on the River Son' (lot 25). Even today this remains one of the most beautiful and least visited sites in the whole of India. Smith captured this scene with sparkling colours and clever effects of light across the broad river. His figures, painted with unusual economy, have tremendous vitality and charm. To me this is the jewel among all the splendid watercolours that the Archers collected. I am delighted that this collection, so carefully put together by two remarkable scholars, should be offered for sale at Christie's. It is a unique opportunity for both museums and collectors to acquire works of the highest merit, such as we now so rarely see on the market. This collection is a fitting tribute to Bill and Tim's long and happy relationship with the Indian subcontinent which they had come to know so intimately. by Giles Eyre, friend and art historian BRITISH PICTURES AND WATERCOLOURS Lots 1 - 49 WILLIAM HODGES, R.A. Lots 1 - 3 Hodges was the first professional landscape painter from Britain to work in India. The paintings and aquatints which he made as a result of his travels in the early 1780s opened the eyes of his contemporaries to India's scenery and architecture and together with his writings, made a vital contribution to the British perception of India's past. Hodges made two major expeditions abroad. Between 1772 and 1775 he travelled as the artist on board the Resolution with Captain Cook on the explorer's second voyage, visiting Antartica, New Zealand and the South Pacific. Having served his apprenticeship with Richard Wilson and learnt to paint landscapes in the classical tradition, he was thrown into observing nature in a very different way. His oils from the period show a keen response to light, to atmospheric effects and to unusual forms and shapes and are generally more impressionistic in style. In 1779 Hodges left England again and spent three years in India. In 1781 he went to Calcutta and from there through the generosity and patronage of Warren Hastings, the Governor General and a man of broad culture, was able to travel widely. His travels furnished him with material to work on for several years after his return. Between 1785 and 1794, he exhibited twenty-five oils of India at the Royal Academy and also engraved forty-eight aquatints from his drawings for his Select Views in India, published in two volumes between 1785 and 1788. All these works provided a new and fresh approach to the Indian scene, viewing it in the 'picturesque' taste and presenting novel material, especially architecture, to the British public in a new manner. All watercolours and pictures are sold framed unless indicated otherwise.

William Hodges (1744-1797)

View of the Fort of Pateeta, near Chunar

Details

William Hodges (1744-1797)
View of the Fort of Pateeta, near Chunar
oil on canvas
24 x 40 in. (61 x 101.7 cm.)

Provenance

Captain Justly Hill and by descent in the family to Mrs Fanny Bramwell, Strand House, Bideford, Devon, January 1968, where purchased for the present collection.

Literature

W.G. Archer, 'Benares through the eyes of British artists.' Apollo, vol. XCII, August 1970, pp. 97-99.
I. C. Stuebe, The Life and Works of William Hodges, New York and London, 1979, p. 256, no. 350, fig. 220.

Exhibited

India Observed, no. 5.

Special notice

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis

Lot Essay

Hodges accompanied Warren Hastings to Benares in 1781. Soon after their arrival on 15 August, the insurrection of Raja Chait Singh took place and Hastings with his entourage, including Hodges, escaped to the fort of Chunar, 25 miles from Benares, where they stayed until they were able to return to the city on 28 September. While Hodges was at Chunar, the British forces under Major Popham captured the fort of Pateeta in mid-September. On 21 September, Hodges accompanied Warren Hastings on a visit and made a drawing of the fort (see Mellon Drawings, vol. III/5, and William Hodges, Travels in India, London, 1793, p. 57.)

The present painting was either painted by Hodges at Chunar in the third week of September or at Benares after his return there on 28 September. It is taken from the Mellon drawing III (5), Cat. 347. Another version of the picture was offered at Christie's, London, 17 July 1987, lot 33. It was not uncommon for him to paint the various forts that had featured in the campaign against Raja Chait Singh for officers who had participated. This particular picture was painted for Captain Justly Hill, from whose collection this picture was purchased in 1968. Captain Justly Hill was commanding the 1st Company, 2nd battallion of the Bengal Artillery at the siege. He also took part in the siege of another of Chait Singh's forts, Bijaigarh, in November 1781, and a painting of which was also painted for him for him by Hodges (see Mellon collection). Major Hill served in the Bengal Artillery from 1763 to 1793. He went on leave to England in 1788 and may have taken both these pictures with him then.

For a similar view see William Hodges, Select Views of India, 1787-8, pl. 44 (see Archer no. 253).

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