George William Mote

George William Mote, Near Guildford, Surrey

1888

This idyllic late 19th-century oil painting by English artist Edward William Cooke RA (1811-1880) depicts a west-country cove with two cottages, donkeys, figures, and fishing boats. Cooke was a highly renowned painter of marine scenes and landscapes who exhibited extensively at London’s Royal Academy. From our elevated vantage point, the view extends between two quaint cottages and across the beach before sweeping around the sandy coastline. Crystalline waters lap the shore, where moored craft rest. It’s an accomplished rendering of a challenging composition. It’s enhanced by trees, which essentially ‘frame’ the right side, while a wooded track provides interest on the left. Cooke was a keen admirer of the Dutch old masters, and the spirit of the Golden Age underpins this splendid work. In diaries, he recorded how he travelled by donkey to access elevated spots in the southwest, so it’s conceivable that he did so here. In his catalogue raisonné, it lists a work from the same year titled ‘Bay with Donkeys’. Born in Pentonville, London, Cooke was raised in the company of accomplished artists as both his father, George Cooke (1781-1834), and his uncle, William Bernard Cooke (1778-1855), were engravers. As such, they were associated with a circle of Victorian painters who aided Cooke’s early development. These included the highly regarded marine painter Clarkson Frederick Stanfield RA RBA (1793-1867), who provided frequent advice and inspiration. Indeed, as a teenager, Cooke produced numerous drawings after Stanfield’s works. A precocious talent, by the age of nine, he was already displaying an advanced understanding of engraving, particularly for ships, coupled with a natural, seemingly in-built skill as a draughtsman. Many of his early drawings depict pastoral landscapes after the masters, such as Nicolaes Berchem (1620-1683), Paulus Potter (1625-1654), and Karel Dujardin (1626-1678). In an extraordinary turn of events, in 1820, his advanced abilities led to his first commission when he provided botanical illustrations for John Loudon's 'Encyclopaedia of Plants’. These were followed by drawings published in the 'Botanical Cabinet...

This mid-19th-century oil painting attributed to Scottish artist William Clark of Greenock (1803-1883) depicts a fully-rigged British frigate sailing off Yarmouth and The Needles, Is...

Provenance: Christie’s, London, 3 March 1922, lot 46 (with The Tower of Babel); James Nicoll Private Collection Sotheby’s, London, 29 March 1983, lot 157 Private Collection, New Yo...

"Aberfeldy" by F. E. Jamieson (British 1895-1950) signed lower corner inscribed verso oil painting on canvas, framed canvas: 12 x 20 inches frame: 15 x 23.5 inches Fine quality antique oil painting by the much admired and celebrated British artist F. E. Jamieson (1895-1950). The painting is signed by Jamieson to the lower corner with one of his pseudonyms. The painting captures this beautifully romantic view of the Scottish Highlands, the whole landscape warmed by the summer sunshine as the harvest fields glow golden light on the river banks to the right. F. E. Jamieson (1895-1950) We are extremely fortunate to have been handling the works of the enigmatic British artist, F. E. Jamieson since the year we began art dealing, 1989. Over this time, coupled with our love of the Scottish landscape, we have bought and sold many hundreds of his paintings, in all their various guises and subjects and are considered by many to be a leading authority on the artist and his work. We are also in the early stages of publishing the Catalogue Raisonne for this artist, of which this painting will be featured. Mr. Jamieson was largely a painter of Scottish landscapes and loch scenes. Born in 1895, Jamieson lived on the south coast of England and was contracted to a large department store to supply them with his paintings. He was an ambitious man and keen to sell more works than through just one shop. In order to do this, he started to sign his works with pseudonyms other than his own name, in order that he could sell his work to a wider audience. It worked and it is considered that Jamieson at least 15 different pseudonym names on his paintings. In addition to selling through furniture shops, Jamieson would travel door to door offering his paintings to housewives and private buyers. In our years of researching the artist, we heard one story related to us by an old customer who remembers that Jamieson started selling door...