Details
French School, late 18th Century, after William Hodges, R.A.
Woman of the Island of Tanna
unstretched and unframed
11 x 8¾in. (27.9 x 22.2cm.)
After J.Basire's engraving (Cook (1771), II, pl.XLV; JS pl. 102) of Hodges' red chalk drawing (JS 2.132)
Woman of the Island of Tanna
unstretched and unframed
11 x 8¾in. (27.9 x 22.2cm.)
After J.Basire's engraving (Cook (1771), II, pl.XLV; JS pl. 102) of Hodges' red chalk drawing (JS 2.132)
Provenance
as Lot 50
The present picture follows the direction of Basire's engraving, though omits the child behind the woman's right shoulder which features in Hodges' drawing and Basire'e engraving. The sweet appearance of Basire's islanders was a distinct development from Hodges' own less attractive drawing of a less attractive subject, which Joppien and
Smith attrbutes to Hodges' indifference to the Melanesians: 'Before he left New Caledonia Hodges completed, as he had at Tana, a portait of a typical man ... and a typical woman ... of the island. They are highly competent works, but wholly impersonal. Melanesians, it seems, made no personal impression on him. These portraits are in a sense a return to that venerable tradition of ethnographic topography which we discussed at the beginning ... The physiognomic interests of the scientists rather than the personal reactions of the artist are once again beginning to hold sway.' (JS p. 99)
'I cannot say the women are beauties; but I think them handsome enough for the men ... Both sexes are of a very dark colour, but not black; ... They make themselves blacker than they really are, by painting their faces with a pigment of the colour of black lead. They also use another which is red, and a third sort brown, or a colour between red and black ... Necklaces are chiefly used by the women, and made mostly of shells.' (Cook (1771), II, p. 80)
The omission or painting out of the child in the present picture, a grinning angel in Basire's engraving at some remove from Hodges' original, might indicate that the painter of this series of oils, or whoever commissioned the group, was keen to avoid the more extravagant and obvious adulterations on the part of the engravers. In other portraits, for example the following lot, the serverity in the engraved portrait is moderated by our painter, suggesting the latter preferred the classical mean melodrama of the following Tierra de Fuegar or the sentimentality of Basire's woman and child of Tana. For a discussion of Basire's engraving of this subject, which may have involved his assistant, William Blake, see JS p. 110
Cook visited New Caledonia in August 1774 before moving on towards New Zealand on the route home to England
The present picture follows the direction of Basire's engraving, though omits the child behind the woman's right shoulder which features in Hodges' drawing and Basire'e engraving. The sweet appearance of Basire's islanders was a distinct development from Hodges' own less attractive drawing of a less attractive subject, which Joppien and
Smith attrbutes to Hodges' indifference to the Melanesians: 'Before he left New Caledonia Hodges completed, as he had at Tana, a portait of a typical man ... and a typical woman ... of the island. They are highly competent works, but wholly impersonal. Melanesians, it seems, made no personal impression on him. These portraits are in a sense a return to that venerable tradition of ethnographic topography which we discussed at the beginning ... The physiognomic interests of the scientists rather than the personal reactions of the artist are once again beginning to hold sway.' (JS p. 99)
'I cannot say the women are beauties; but I think them handsome enough for the men ... Both sexes are of a very dark colour, but not black; ... They make themselves blacker than they really are, by painting their faces with a pigment of the colour of black lead. They also use another which is red, and a third sort brown, or a colour between red and black ... Necklaces are chiefly used by the women, and made mostly of shells.' (Cook (1771), II, p. 80)
The omission or painting out of the child in the present picture, a grinning angel in Basire's engraving at some remove from Hodges' original, might indicate that the painter of this series of oils, or whoever commissioned the group, was keen to avoid the more extravagant and obvious adulterations on the part of the engravers. In other portraits, for example the following lot, the serverity in the engraved portrait is moderated by our painter, suggesting the latter preferred the classical mean melodrama of the following Tierra de Fuegar or the sentimentality of Basire's woman and child of Tana. For a discussion of Basire's engraving of this subject, which may have involved his assistant, William Blake, see JS p. 110
Cook visited New Caledonia in August 1774 before moving on towards New Zealand on the route home to England