.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
George Barret was one of the most celebrated and best-known Irish landscape painters of the 18th Century. Born in Dublin, the son of a clothier, he was for a time an apprentice to a stay-maker and later coloured prints before going to the Dublin Society Schools, under Robert West, where he distinguished himself at the annual examination for prizes held by the Dublin Society in 1747, winning a first prize.
Early in his career, he came under the influence of Edmund Burke who may have noticed the young artist's prize-winning work exhibited in the Parliament House, just across the way from Trinity College where Burke was un undergraduate. At that time, Burke, who was just a few years Barret's senior, had already established a reputation as a formidable orator and philosopher and had begun work on his seminal essay, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful, published in 1757. Burke's ideas of the Sublime in nature seem to have encouraged Barret to study from nature and to paint Romantic scenery. It was also said that it was Burke who first introduced the painter to the second Viscount Powerscourt for whom he worked in the first years of his career, sketching the most Romantic reaches of the Dargle Valley and the celebrated Powerscourt waterfall. Barret's View of Powerscourt House under the Sugar Loaf Mountain (British Art Center, Yale) and Powerscourt Waterfall (National Gallery of Ireland, no. 174; Irish Paintings in the National Gallery of Ireland, I, Dublin, 2001, pp. 43-6, no. 174, illustrated) reflect Burke's ideas of the sublime in nature and are considered among his most successful compositions.
In 1763 Barret left Dublin with some of his finest pictures, determined to try his fortune in London where he was hoping to find a wider market for his artistic talent. The following year he won a Premium for a landscape at the Free Society's exhibition and he soon established a reputation for himself as one of the leading landscape painters of his generation and a rival to his English contemporary Richard Wilson, becoming a founder member of the Royal Academy in 1768. In England Barret found a ready market for his landscapes and views and he counted among his patrons some of the most influential figures of the day including the Duke of Portland and Lord Dalkeith, later 4th Duke of Buccleuch, and Lord Rockingham, and the famous collector the first Lord de Tabley. For further information on the artist see A. Crookshank and the Knight of Glin, Ireland's Painters 1600-1940, New Haven and London, 2002, pp.133-8).
Early in his career, he came under the influence of Edmund Burke who may have noticed the young artist's prize-winning work exhibited in the Parliament House, just across the way from Trinity College where Burke was un undergraduate. At that time, Burke, who was just a few years Barret's senior, had already established a reputation as a formidable orator and philosopher and had begun work on his seminal essay, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful, published in 1757. Burke's ideas of the Sublime in nature seem to have encouraged Barret to study from nature and to paint Romantic scenery. It was also said that it was Burke who first introduced the painter to the second Viscount Powerscourt for whom he worked in the first years of his career, sketching the most Romantic reaches of the Dargle Valley and the celebrated Powerscourt waterfall. Barret's View of Powerscourt House under the Sugar Loaf Mountain (British Art Center, Yale) and Powerscourt Waterfall (National Gallery of Ireland, no. 174; Irish Paintings in the National Gallery of Ireland, I, Dublin, 2001, pp. 43-6, no. 174, illustrated) reflect Burke's ideas of the sublime in nature and are considered among his most successful compositions.
In 1763 Barret left Dublin with some of his finest pictures, determined to try his fortune in London where he was hoping to find a wider market for his artistic talent. The following year he won a Premium for a landscape at the Free Society's exhibition and he soon established a reputation for himself as one of the leading landscape painters of his generation and a rival to his English contemporary Richard Wilson, becoming a founder member of the Royal Academy in 1768. In England Barret found a ready market for his landscapes and views and he counted among his patrons some of the most influential figures of the day including the Duke of Portland and Lord Dalkeith, later 4th Duke of Buccleuch, and Lord Rockingham, and the famous collector the first Lord de Tabley. For further information on the artist see A. Crookshank and the Knight of Glin, Ireland's Painters 1600-1940, New Haven and London, 2002, pp.133-8).