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Lot Essay
A sketch for Landseer's larger (45 x 60cm.) picture exhibited at the British Institution, 1827, no 46. This latter picture (The Property of Rex. de C. Nan Kivell, Esq., C.M.G., Sotheby's, 14 May 1970, lot 130) is now in a private collection, Rio de Janeiro, with the preparatory drawing (for both of which see the exhibition catalogue Mostra de Redescobrimento, Brasil 500 é Mais, 'O Olhar Distante', Sao Paulo, 2000, p.265).
Landseer accompanied Sir Charles Stuart on his British Mission to the Brazils in 1825-26. His extraordinary album of Brazilian drawings ('The Highcliffe Album' sold in these Rooms, 29 April 1999, lots 1-18) was retained by his employer, Stuart, on the Mission's return to England, depriving the young Landseer of his field sketches with the result that very few Brazilian subjects were worked up into finished pictures. Four pictures were exhibited at the Royal Society of British Artists in 1827, including three from his travels with Stuart in Brazil, and just one, the larger picture worked up from the present study, at the British Institution in 1827. Of these, just two are extant, the latter picture and the recently discovered 'Sugar-Loaf Mountain, Rio de Janeiro' (R.B.A., 1827, no.423), now part of the Coleção Brasiliana - FRP/FE, Sao Paulo.
The present picture, unidentified in the Christie's sale in 1966, is therefore an important addition to Landseer's small output of Brazilian pictures, and all the more significant for adding to the few Sao Paulo subjects by any artists which survive from this period.
The present sketch is clearly an intermediate work, following the drawing but introducing some of the elements that will be added in the final larger picture (the animal skin that covers the sacks behind the merchant, the pipe and striped shorts worn by the slave in the background). The latter picture was probably worked up from this oil sketch rather than from the original drawing, which was retained by Stuart and inaccessible to the artist after the return to England in 1826. This in turn infers that the present oil sketch was executed in Brazil alongside the drawing.
Landseer accompanied Sir Charles Stuart on his British Mission to the Brazils in 1825-26. His extraordinary album of Brazilian drawings ('The Highcliffe Album' sold in these Rooms, 29 April 1999, lots 1-18) was retained by his employer, Stuart, on the Mission's return to England, depriving the young Landseer of his field sketches with the result that very few Brazilian subjects were worked up into finished pictures. Four pictures were exhibited at the Royal Society of British Artists in 1827, including three from his travels with Stuart in Brazil, and just one, the larger picture worked up from the present study, at the British Institution in 1827. Of these, just two are extant, the latter picture and the recently discovered 'Sugar-Loaf Mountain, Rio de Janeiro' (R.B.A., 1827, no.423), now part of the Coleção Brasiliana - FRP/FE, Sao Paulo.
The present picture, unidentified in the Christie's sale in 1966, is therefore an important addition to Landseer's small output of Brazilian pictures, and all the more significant for adding to the few Sao Paulo subjects by any artists which survive from this period.
The present sketch is clearly an intermediate work, following the drawing but introducing some of the elements that will be added in the final larger picture (the animal skin that covers the sacks behind the merchant, the pipe and striped shorts worn by the slave in the background). The latter picture was probably worked up from this oil sketch rather than from the original drawing, which was retained by Stuart and inaccessible to the artist after the return to England in 1826. This in turn infers that the present oil sketch was executed in Brazil alongside the drawing.