12
Sir John Lavery RA RSA RHA (1856-1941)
Estimate:
€60,000 - €80,000
Sold
€95,000
Live Auction
Important Irish Art
Size
10 by 14in. (25.4 by 35.6cm)
Description
Title: MISS ALICE FULTON AT PAISLEY LAWN TENNIS CLUB, 1889
Note: During the early summer of 1889 John Lavery returned to Paisley to make kit-kat sketches of members of the Clark family, the town’s Provost, Robert Cochrane, and other dignitaries who had been invited to the reception held for The State Visit of Queen Victoria to the Glasgow International Exhibition in the previous year [1]. These tinyportraits would come together with 250 others in a largecommemorative canvas depicting the event (Glasgow Museums). The year had begun in a flurry of travel arrangements and studio bookings. By the late spring the project was well underway. Lavery had justreturned from Darmstadt where he had painted the portrait of Princess Alix of Hesse, (Private Collection) and other members of the royal retinue, when the short trip from Glasgow to Paisley was arranged. A visit, however brief, could not be made without calling upon friends inthe town where he had staged his first solo exhibition in 1886. Principally these were members of the Fulton family who, on that particular day, had taken their daughter, Alice, to the local tennis club.The friendship began within months of Lavery’s return from Grez sur Loing at the end of 1884, when the artist came to the attention of Joseph Fulton, Alice’s father. The co-owner of a large cloth scouring, finishing and dyeing works, inherited from his grandfather, the family was one of Paisley’s biggest employers. The family lived in some style,at Glenfield House, a baronial mansion built in 1859, on an estate overlooking the town. There, three small dams were constructed to supply soft water to the Fultons’ factory from a burn that flowed from the nearby Glenifer Braes. The mill-owner offered Lavery a cottage adjacent to one of these ponds, close to the house, to act as his studio(fig. 1) while he painted the portraits of Alice and Eva, his daughters (Paisley Art Institute), and other works in the district [2].During these years Lavery also maintained a studio in St Vincent Street, Glasgow, in what might be described as the artist’s quarter, in close proximity to Glasgow Art Club, of which he was a member.The present tennis club sketch is one of two known to have been painted on the spot, relating to a larger, more finished canvas depicting the blossoming cherry tree canopy that fringed the court (fig 2) [3].Swiftly executed, the present sketch carries all the freshness of the moment when a conversation continues, oblivious to the girl whose eye engages the painter. Three years before, when a mere infant and commanded to sit still, Lavery had been obliged to resort to photographs to obtain her likeness. Ten years on from the present sketch, he would return for more formal portraits of her and her uncle,when she adopted a distinctly Whistlerian pose (fig 3).However, in the midst of a year when time was measured in end-on appointments, dropping into the Paisley Lawn Tennis Club, was a moment of delight. One had only to open a little pochade box or erect a lightweight tripod easel for the picture to come to him, unbidden.Lavery would later describe such moments as ones that brought him to ‘concert pitch’. These were times when in the elysian garden of women, the scene composed itself if you were quick enough to grasp its essence. In the present instance, there was no hesitation.[1] For further reference to this project, see Kenneth McConkey, John Lavery,A Painter and his World, 2010 (Atelier Books, Edinburgh), pp. 43-48.[2] Thereafter, what was originally ‘Burn Crook’, became known as ‘Lavery Cottage’.The Pond at the Glen, Paisley, (fig 1) represents the view of Glenfield House (now demolished) a few steps from Lavery’s cottage.[3] McConkey 2010, p. 49; see also Kenneth McConkey, ‘Tennis Parties’ in Ann Sumner ed., Court on Canvas, Tennis in Art, 2011, (exhibition catalogue, Barber Institute, Birmingham), pp. 63-4. In the companion sketch (Private Collection), Alice holds a tennis racquet on her lap and the women on the left, one holding a scarlet parasol, have swopped places. The background, simply indicated with a broad brush, represents one of the courts.
Frame dimensions: 16 by 20in. (40.6 by 50.8cm)
Note: During the early summer of 1889 John Lavery returned to Paisley to make kit-kat sketches of members of the Clark family, the town’s Provost, Robert Cochrane, and other dignitaries who had been invited to the reception held for The State Visit of Queen Victoria to the Glasgow International Exhibition in the previous year [1]. These tinyportraits would come together with 250 others in a largecommemorative canvas depicting the event (Glasgow Museums). The year had begun in a flurry of travel arrangements and studio bookings. By the late spring the project was well underway. Lavery had justreturned from Darmstadt where he had painted the portrait of Princess Alix of Hesse, (Private Collection) and other members of the royal retinue, when the short trip from Glasgow to Paisley was arranged. A visit, however brief, could not be made without calling upon friends inthe town where he had staged his first solo exhibition in 1886. Principally these were members of the Fulton family who, on that particular day, had taken their daughter, Alice, to the local tennis club.The friendship began within months of Lavery’s return from Grez sur Loing at the end of 1884, when the artist came to the attention of Joseph Fulton, Alice’s father. The co-owner of a large cloth scouring, finishing and dyeing works, inherited from his grandfather, the family was one of Paisley’s biggest employers. The family lived in some style,at Glenfield House, a baronial mansion built in 1859, on an estate overlooking the town. There, three small dams were constructed to supply soft water to the Fultons’ factory from a burn that flowed from the nearby Glenifer Braes. The mill-owner offered Lavery a cottage adjacent to one of these ponds, close to the house, to act as his studio(fig. 1) while he painted the portraits of Alice and Eva, his daughters (Paisley Art Institute), and other works in the district [2].During these years Lavery also maintained a studio in St Vincent Street, Glasgow, in what might be described as the artist’s quarter, in close proximity to Glasgow Art Club, of which he was a member.The present tennis club sketch is one of two known to have been painted on the spot, relating to a larger, more finished canvas depicting the blossoming cherry tree canopy that fringed the court (fig 2) [3].Swiftly executed, the present sketch carries all the freshness of the moment when a conversation continues, oblivious to the girl whose eye engages the painter. Three years before, when a mere infant and commanded to sit still, Lavery had been obliged to resort to photographs to obtain her likeness. Ten years on from the present sketch, he would return for more formal portraits of her and her uncle,when she adopted a distinctly Whistlerian pose (fig 3).However, in the midst of a year when time was measured in end-on appointments, dropping into the Paisley Lawn Tennis Club, was a moment of delight. One had only to open a little pochade box or erect a lightweight tripod easel for the picture to come to him, unbidden.Lavery would later describe such moments as ones that brought him to ‘concert pitch’. These were times when in the elysian garden of women, the scene composed itself if you were quick enough to grasp its essence. In the present instance, there was no hesitation.[1] For further reference to this project, see Kenneth McConkey, John Lavery,A Painter and his World, 2010 (Atelier Books, Edinburgh), pp. 43-48.[2] Thereafter, what was originally ‘Burn Crook’, became known as ‘Lavery Cottage’.The Pond at the Glen, Paisley, (fig 1) represents the view of Glenfield House (now demolished) a few steps from Lavery’s cottage.[3] McConkey 2010, p. 49; see also Kenneth McConkey, ‘Tennis Parties’ in Ann Sumner ed., Court on Canvas, Tennis in Art, 2011, (exhibition catalogue, Barber Institute, Birmingham), pp. 63-4. In the companion sketch (Private Collection), Alice holds a tennis racquet on her lap and the women on the left, one holding a scarlet parasol, have swopped places. The background, simply indicated with a broad brush, represents one of the courts.
Frame dimensions: 16 by 20in. (40.6 by 50.8cm)
Condition
Some surface dust visible. Drying cracks visible on close inspection in the white painted area, centre. This area appears stable. Otherwise very good condition.
Medium
oil on canvas
Signature
signed and dedicated [To Miss Alice Fulton] lower right
