Edward Matthew Ward – my daily art display

Southport’s Atkinson Gallery

The Atkinson Gallery, Southport

Art galleries or Museums of Art come in various shapes and sizes from the gigantic multi-room edifices such as London’s National Gallery, Paris’ Louvre and Madrid’s Prado, to small one-room private galleries. The former is awash with works which would take you days to properly study them all, whilst the latter often contain less than fifty paintings and you are sometimes hard-pressed to see a work you like.

A couple of days ago I visited Southport on the Merseyside coast, a seaside resort which is close to where I was born and lived for most of my life and yet I had never visited the town’s art gallery. There was something about the site’s publicity I found off-putting. You see, it was a multi-faceted building; part museum, part library, part café, part children’s playroom, part theatre, part bar, part locals selling their art and crafts etc etc., and yet there was only a small shop/theatre ticket office which had no literature on the permanent collection and as I feared, the room set aside for works of fine art was small. However the works of art in the permanent collection, numbering about fifty, were excellent and for that reason I can recommend you visit their permanent collection. Today’s blog is about some of these fine works. There were a number of paintings, presumably on loan, which belonged to the Harris Museum and Art Gallery in the nearby town, Preston, which had been closed whilst undergoing renovations.

A Golden Dream by Thomas Cooper Gotch (1895)

Thomas Cooper Gotch was an English painter and book illustrator. He studied art in London and Antwerp before he married and studied in Paris with his wife, Caroline, a fellow artist, and when they returned to England, initially his works depicted the lives of Newlyn fisherfolk but after a visit to Italy his style changed and he began painting Symbolist images conjuring up dreamlike idylls of Arcadian innocence, in a Pre-Raphaelite romantic style. Gotch exhibited A Golden Dream for the 1895 opening of the Newlyn Art Gallery.

Cordelia Disinherited - John Rogers Herbert als Kunstdruck oder Gemälde.

Cordelia Disinherited by John Rogers Herbert (1850)

The subject of John Rogers Herbert’s painting is Cordelia, a fictional character in William Shakespeare’s tragic play King Lear. Cordelia, along with her sisters, Goneril and Regen are the three daughters of King Lear. After her elderly father offers her the opportunity to profess her love for him in return for one-third of the land in his kingdom, she, unlike her two sisters, refuses. Lear banishes Cordelia from the kingdom and disinherits her. Cordelia is depicted as a saintly figure. She looks impassive and wears blue and white clothes which remind us of depictions of the Virgin Mary. Herbert painting is a detail from a large fresco commissioned for the Houses of Parliament.

The Orphan of the Temple by Edward Matthew Ward (1875)

On the face of it, we are simply looking at an elegant young lady painting en plein air. The title of the painting does not offer us a clue as to what is going on in the depiction ! However, if I tell you that the young lady painting is Marie Thérèse Charlotte, the eldest daughter of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette you will realise that this painting depicts a little piece of French history. In a brief synopsis of Marie Thérèse Charlotte life : she was the daughter of Louis XVI, king of France and Marie Antoinette. She was educated at French was imprisoned with her family in the Temple, originally a fortified monastery of the Templars and later a royal prison, in 1792. Her mother and father were guillotined in 1793 although she was unaware of their fate at the time. She was released from prison in 1795 and four years later married the Duke of Angoulême. Later she lived in exile with her uncle Louis XVIII in various European countries. The painting clearly contrasts the innocence of the young woman, dressed in white, with her gaoler who stands in the background.

On the Bridge by Stanhope Forbes (1925)

Stanhope Alexander Forbes was a British artist and a founding member of the influential Newlyn School of painters. He was often referred to as the father of the Newlyn School. This is the second time Stanhope Forbes painted this scene. The first was in 1888. The old bridge we see in the painting is in the Cornish village of Street-an-Nowan, in the lower part of the fishing town of Newlyn.

The Fish Fag by William Banks Fortescue (1888)

Fortescue was also one of the Newlyn School’s many Birmingham-born artists. He began his career as an engineering designer but later trained as an artist. He studied art in Paris, and later travelled around Europe, reaching Venice in 1884. On his return he exhibited many of his works depicting Venetian scenes at the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists. Fortescue went to live in the Cornish fishing town of Newlyn around 1885 and took lodgings in a house which also included Stanhope Forbes as another lodger. This work by Fortescue was painted in the style of Stanhope Forbes and as is the case with this work, he used local people to model for his paintings. The painting’s title Fish Fag is the term used for “Fishwife” and she would be in charge of cleaning the fish prior to them being sold. Prior to the men setting sail in their boats the Fish Fags would also be tasked with baiting the hooks. The little boy holding the toy boat and walking alongside the woman has probably been added by the artist implying that one day he will experience life as a fisherman.

Welcome, Bonny Boat! The Fisherman’s Return (Scene at Clovelly, North Devon) by James Clark Hook (1856)

The life of a fisherman is a precarious one, even in the present day but more so in the nineteenth century. Catching fish to feed the family was a necessity and sometimes the fisherfolk heading out to sea to bring home food and to eke out a living sometimes meant taking risks which often resulted in dire consequences. James Clarke Hook RA., an English painter and etcher of marine, genre, historical scenes, and landscapes, was born in London in November 1819. Initially his favoured painting genre was history painting but then he turned his attention to genre depictions in rural landscapes. He made several trips to Devon and the fishing village of Clovelly which in Devon stimulated him to adopt coastal scenes as his main motif but it was more than just depictions of the sea and boats as he incorporated figures into his paintings in order to highlight the hardship and rewards of life by the sea. He completed so many of this type of depiction that his coastal paintings were soon dubbed “Hookscapes”. In this painting we see a returning fisherman being greeted by his family, all of who are relieved to see him back safely.

Katy’s Letter by Haynes King (1875)

Haynes King was an English genre painter, who was born in Barbados in December 1831. He came to London when he was twenty-three and became a student at Leigh’s later known as Heatherley’s Academy in Newman Street, London. In 1857 he exhibited some of his paintings for the first time at the Society of British Artists, of which he was elected a member in 1864 ; many of his works appeared at its exhibitions, and forty-eight were shown at the Royal Academy between 1860 and 1904. He painted interiors, landscapes, and coastal scenes with figures. The motif in this painting centres around the letter which the young woman is reading. The action of reading a letter was depicted in many paintings and became very popular. The popularity of such a motif is probably because we are subconsciously being asked to imagine what was in the letter. Good news or bad news? We then put together in our minds a cover story both past and future for this young woman due to what she is reading !

The Argument by Tristram Hillier (1943)

Tristram Paul Hillier was an English surrealist painter and a member of the Unit One group led by Paul Nash . He was born on April 11^th 1905 in Beijing, China, and was the youngest of the four children of Edward Guy Hillier, a banker and diplomat, and Ada Everett. He attended Downside, an independent boarding school. He later went to Christ’s College, Cambridge and later in 1926, the Slade, where his tutors included Henry Tonks. From the Slade he travelled to Paris and studied for two years under André Lhote, and also at the Atelier Colarossi. Whilst in Paris he mixed with many members of the Surrealist movement and was particularly influenced by Giorgio de Chirico and Max Ernst. He lived in France until 1940, but travelled extensively; he remained a surrealist painter throughout his life. His painting style is unique to him and if you look at some of his other paintings you will recognise similar characteristics.

The Children’s Prayer by Arthur Hacker (1888)

There were a number of paintings on show with religious connotations. One such work was Children’s Prayer by the English painter Arthur Hacker. Hacker was born in St. Pancras, Middlesex in September 1858. In 1876, aged eighteen, he enrolled on a four-year course at the Royal Academy. From there he went to Paris where he studied at the atelier of Léon Bonnat. He became a member of the Royal Society of Portrait painters in 1894. His paintings were shown at the Royal Academy on two occasions, in 1878 and 1910. It was also in 1910 that he was elected as a Royal Academician. He travelled to France, Italy, Spain and Morocco., and of the RA in 1910. Hacker was most known for painting religious scenes and portraits.

La Prière du Matin (Morning Prayer) by André-Henri Dargelas (c.1860)

André Henri Dargelas, a French painter of the realist movement, was born in Bordeaux on October 11^th 1828. In his twenties, his paintings became very popular in England due to the positive assessment of his work made by the English art critic, John Ruskin, who liked Dargelas’ sentimental vision as seen in many of his paintings. In 1857 he began to exhibit his work at the Paris Salon and the motifs of his paintings were influenced by the very popular eighteenth century French artist, Jean Siméon Chardin.

The Word by Keith Henderson (1931)

The above painting is more modern in comparison to those I have showcased earlier and some would say a more realistic view on religious trends and differing views of the old and young on the subject of religious worship. The Word was completed by Keith Henderson in 1931. Keith Henderson was a Scottish painter born in Aberdeenshire in April 1883. He was one of three children born to George MacDonald Henderson, a barrister at Lincoln’s Inn, and Constance Helen, née Keith. He attended Orme Square School in London before being admitted to Marlborough College, a prestigious Wiltshire public school. He then studied at the Slade School of Art before moving to Paris and studying art at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. During the First World War he served as a Captain with the Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry where he spent time in the trenches acting as a war artist. He recorded his time on the Western Front in a book, Letters to Helen: Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front, which included several of his illustrations. During the 1930s Henderson returned to Scotland to live on the Isle of Barra in the Outer Hebrides where his paintings at the time depicted village life. He was forty-eight when he completed The Word which depicts an old lady seen distributing free bibles coming across a group of young revellers who have just come out of the local pub. They seem to be little interested in her offer. The depiction harks back to Victorian moralistic paintings.

By the Waters of Babylon we sat down and wept by William Etty (1832)

“…By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion.

We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.

For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?…”

My final painting in this blog also has religious associations as it illustrates a passage from the tragic 137th psalm of the Book of Psalms in the Tanakh, the Jewish bible. The painting by William Etty, By the Waters of Babylon depicts the biblical story of the Israelites’ captivity in Babylon. The psalm is a communal lament about remembering Zion, and yearning for Jerusalem while dwelling in exile during the Babylonian captivity. The psalm reflects the yearning of the exiles for Jerusalem as well as hatred for the Holy City’s enemies. In Etty’s painting the lyre can be seen hanging from the tree. William Etty was an English artist best known for his history paintings containing nude figures. He was the first significant British painter of nudes and still lifes and in this “religious” painting the three women depicted are in a state of undress.

Hogarth’s Studio in 1739 by Edward Matthew Ward

One of the unexpected pleasures I get when I visit an art gallery to see a specific exhibition is that having observed the exhibition I always like to walk around and see the paintings in the gallery’s permanent collection and it is then that you unearth some gems. When I visited the York Art Gallery to take in the William Etty exhibition I gave myself time to have a look at some of the gallery’s other paintings and it also gave me a reason to escape the clutches of the semi-naked live art performer (see My Daily Art Display of December 12th). It was during this perusal of the works that I came across a painting by Edward Matthew Ward and it is his painting entitled Hogarth’s Studio in 1739 that I am featuring in today’s edition of My Daily Art Display.

Edward Matthew Ward was born in Pimlico, London in 1816 and has been classified as an English narrative painter. Narrative paintings are an art form that tell a story. This is a long tradition in the world of art and probably dates back to the time of the ancient Egyptians. Popular trends in narrative painting have included history paintings which incorporates the likes of biblical, mythological, and historical themes and which were popular during the period of the Renaissance to the 18th century. We have already seen in earlier blogs of mine the moralizing story series of William Hogarth’s Marriage à la Mode ; and then in the 19th-century the narrative art turned more towards anecdotal and sentimental narratives, usually depicting domestic scenes. In narrative paintings of the 19th century, the title became an important part of the artwork, often explaining the message.

Edward Ward’s parents encouraged his early interest in art and he was sent to a number of art schools, including that of John Cawse, the portraitist and history painter. Ward was a very talented artist even at an early age and even won an award from the Society of Arts at the age of 14. At the age of eighteen he exhibited his first work at the Royal Academy and the following year, 1835, he enrolled as a student at the Royal Academy Schools. At the age of twenty he set off from England and went to Rome where he remained for three years and it was whilst he was there that he achieved another artistic award. This time it was a silver medal presented to him by the Rome Academy of St Luke for his work entitled Cimbaue and Giotto, which he sent back to London and which was exhibited in the 1839 R.A. exhibition.

He returned to England in 1839 but on the way back Ward visited Munich to learn the technique of modern fresco painting. The reason behind that was that he wanted to take part in the competition to decorate the Palace of Westminster. In London, the old Houses of Parliament had been destroyed by fire in 1834 and the new Houses of Parliament at Westminster were built. Competitions were held for appropriate designs (‘cartoons’), with a number of leading artists commissioned to take part. To organise and oversee this project, a Royal Commission had been appointed in 1841, the President of which was Queen Victoria’s new consort Prince Albert. In all there were three annual competitions. The competition rules were that each artist would submit a full sized cartoon (preparatory drawing) with specimens of fresco or other techniques suitable for murals. The design of their submitted work had to be scenes from British History or Literature or personifications of abstract representations of Religion, Justice and the Spirit of Chivalry. Ward submitted his cartoon entitled Boadicea in the 1843 competition, but it was unsuccessful. However nine years later, in 1852, mainly because of his much admired historical works, he was commissioned to produce eight pictures for the corridors of the Palace of Westminster, on subjects drawn from the English Civil War. These were to depict parallel episodes on the two sides in the Civil War. Ward’s paintings depicted the opposed figures, as if confronting one another, across the corridor. By now Ward’s work was becoming very popular and he was never short of commissions.

In 1843, the twenty-seven year old Ward met Henrietta Ward the eleven year old daughter of George Raphael Ward, the artist and printmaker and Mary Webb Ward the miniaturist. Henrietta was besotted with Ward and despite the great age difference they eloped, with the help of Ward’s friend the author Wilkie Collins, and married in 1848 when she was just sixteen years of age. Henrietta’s parents were devastated and angered by this turn of events and her mother never forgave her and in fact, disinherited her. The couple went on to have eight children, one of whom, a son, Leslie, was later to become a portraitist and well-known caricaturist and cartoonist, who had many of his works printed in magazines, such as Vanity Fair. Henrietta although kept busy with her large brood of children was also a noted historical painter and her paintings of children, for which she used her own as models, were also very popular.

Edward Ward was very much influenced by the work of the English narrative artist William Hogarth and during the 1860’s he would mimic Hogarth’s style in his works which depicted incidents from British history. Ward’s life changed dramatically in the late 1870’s when he started to suffer from a painful and debilitating illness which caused him to have prolonged bouts of depression. In January 1879, aged 62, Edward Matthew Ward committed suicide.

The featured painting in My Daily Art Display today is entitled Hogarth’s Studio in 1739. Edward Ward completed this oil on canvas work in 1863. The setting for this painting, as the title implies, is the studio of the great English painter William Hogarth. Hogarth’s completed portrait of Captain Thomas Coram is seen on display. Coram was a philanthropic sea captain who had established the Foundling Hospital in London, in 1741. It was a children’s home established for the “education and maintenance of exposed and deserted young children.” Although the word “hospital” is in the title of the painting, the establishment itself was not a medical facility. It simply indicated that it was a place of “hospitality” to those children who had fallen on hard times. The Foundling’s Hospital had a number of artistic connections. William Hogarth, who was childless, had a long association with the Hospital and was a founding Governor. It was he who designed the children’s uniforms and the establishment’s coat of arms and Hogarth and his wife Jane fostered foundling children. Hogarth also decided to set up a permanent art exhibition in the new buildings, and encouraged other artists to produce work for the hospital. Many of Hogarth’s contemporaries, such as Gainsborough, Reynolds, Richard Wilson and Francis Hayman gave works to the establishment.

We see numerous children in the painting. All in their best clothes having come from the Foundling Hospital to Hogarth’s studio, to see the painting. To the left of the painting we see Hogarth’s wife, Jane standing at the table, slicing up the fruit cake. The little boy standing by Mrs. Hogarth has no time for the painting which is on display; all he is concerned about are the cakes! Hiding behind the painting we see the artist Hogarth and the subject of the work, Thomas Coram. Look at the little girl who stands in front of the portrait peering up hesitantly at it, as if it is the real Captain Coram. Another girl wearing a red-hooded cloak sits to the right of the painting. She, we must presume, is crippled and unable to stand for long periods of time as her crutches lie on the floor next to her. The girl to her right dressed in a sumptuous blue dress animatedly tells her all about the painting. Take time and look at the wonderful facial expressions of the children. I love how the artist has incorporated a multi-paneled window in the background and through it we catch a glimpse of a garden. On the floor we see a globe and a book which Hogarth has used in his painting of the seafarer presumably symbolizing Coram’s travels and knowledge.

It is a beautiful painting and but for my visit to the Etty exhibition in the York Art Gallery, I may never have set eyes on the work.