John Frederick Lewis - A Highland crofter

Price Realized £2,990

pencil and watercolour, heightened with gum arabic, and with scratching out
7 x 11.1/8 in. (19.6 x 8.3 cm.)

This drawing is an early work by Lewis probably deriving from studies made on a tour of Scotland in 1830. A number of Scottish subjects are recorded by Major General Lewis in his catalogue (see Major General Lewis, John Frederick Lewis, R.A. 1805-1876, Leigh on Sea, p. 64, nos. 110-114 and 116-130).

A slightly larger watercolour entitled Highland Hospitality was exhibited by Lewis at the Old Watercolour Society in 1832 and is now in the collection at the Yale Center for British Art (see J. Baynard, Works of Splendour and Imagination; The Exhibition Watercolour, 1981, Yale Exhibition Catalogue no. 79, illustrated).