Live Auction 5201Style & Spirit
A PAIR OF GEORGE III BLACK, OCHRE AND WHITE-PAINTED PICTURES
Lot 62 Purchased in Naples in 1829 for his Grecian library at Mere Hall, Cheshire by Peter Langford-Brooke (d. 1840), these pictures formed part of a collection of thirty 'paintings of vases at studio', which were noted as costing £76 (Mere Hall, Christie's house sale catalogue, 23 May 1994, p. 131). Their Grecian scenes are taken from ancient vases in the collection formed at Naples by Sir William Hamilton (d. 1802) and illustrated in Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein's Collection of Etruscan, Greek and Roman Antiquities from the Cabinet of the Hon. W. Hamilton, his Britannic Majesty's Envoy Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary at the Court of Naples, 1767 (vol. II, pl. 45 and vol. I, pl. 52). In the late 18th century such 'paintings' had been seen by the court architect Charles Heathcote Tatham (d. 1842), who wrote from Rome in 1796 about the invention by Tischbein (d. 1829), the Director of the Royal Academy of Paintings at Naples, of manufacturing prints and borders in the Etruscan style copied from Sir William Hamilton's vases and adapted to small rooms and cabinets.

A PAIR OF GEORGE III BLACK, OCHRE AND WHITE-PAINTED PICTURES

ATTRIBUTED TO JOHANN HEINRICH WILHELM TISCHBEIN (1751-1829)

Closed27 November 2007

Price Realised

GBP 3,250

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A PAIR OF GEORGE III BLACK, OCHRE AND WHITE-PAINTED PICTURES
ATTRIBUTED TO JOHANN HEINRICH WILHELM TISCHBEIN (1751-1829)
The centres black, ochre and white paint on a partly etched base varnished over, the geometric borders varnished over engravings, with painted square inserts at the corners, one depicting a seated hero with attendants and Eros approaching with a Garland; the other depicting Zeus and Hera with Eros descending to Europa and the Bull below, both with decorative borders below showing a youthful head wearing a Phrygian cap emerging from petals of a flower, in modern ebonised reeded frames
One 44½ x 34¼in. (113 x 87 cm.); the other 44¾ x 34¾in. (114 x 88 cm.) overall (2)

Bought by Peter Langford-Brooke, Esq. (d. 1840) on 10 March 1829 in Naples and by descent at Mere Hall, Knutsford, Cheshire to Mrs. Helen Langford-Brooke (+), Mere Hall, Knutsford, Cheshire, sold Christie's house sale, 23 May 1994, lot 202 (£6,900).

Specialist note

The central panels are from Tischbein's Collection of Etruscan, Greek and Roman Antiquities from the Cabinet of the Hon. W. Hamilton, his Britannic Majesty's Envoy Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary at the Court of Naples, 1767, II, pl. 45.