Thursday, June 30, 2016


THE  STORMING  OF  BUDA(PEST) 1686
LOST  ART  TREASURES  OF  KINLOCH  CASTLE

IMAGE COPYRIGHT © George W. Randall Archive



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INTRODUCTION:


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In the 1978, 1992 and 2007 Inventory’s of Contents the remaining pictures are given
scant recognition, more often those in a room being clubbed together as
“a number of engravings” without any detail.

Then there are the recorded pictures that over the years have become damaged,
removed, hidden away, badly stored and disappeared.
During my numerous visits to Kinloch Castle I have found, photographed
and researched those discovered in great detail, here is a small selection.


BATTLESCENE  -  THE STORMING OF BUDA(PEST) 
  
Original oil painting by Pauwels Casteel  (sometimes Pauwel Casteels 
the Younger), born Antwerp c.1625 died c.1701.
A Flemish painter and draughtsman particularly noted for 
his historical paintings and battle scenes. 
He was registered  a master of the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke.

Casteel married Elisabeth Bosschaert, they had a son, 
also called Pauwels, (Peter), 
who trained under his father becoming a gifted painter 
in his own right, particularly of still life.



ASSESSMENT OF PAINTING        
by Professional Conservator  -  March 1996:

Size: 253 x 122 centimetres. (100 x 48 inches)
Overall condition: Poor. 
Canvas, Stretcher and Frame stained by moisture.
Paint in extremely unstable condition and over a wide area a result of water damage
evidenced by examining the back.
 
Woodworm infestation - recent activity noted along bottom.
Very dirty.
Studio restoration urgently required - 
Estimated cost in 1996 £3,750 - £4,750
plus professional preparation on site for transport, 
cost of crate, carriage costs each way. 
In June 1996 the painting was professionally valued at £60,000.

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Great Glen House, Leachkin Road, Inverness, Scotland. IV3 8NW 

Telephone: 01463 725   *   Email: enquiries@nature.scot



SOMEONE MUST BE HELD TO ACCOUNT!
Please read notes at end of this post.

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BOER WAR FAREWELL
Photograph October 2005   *   George W. Randall Archive ©
















There is no record of this work in any of the four Inventories in my possession.


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MARIE  THEREZE  CHARLOTTE  DE  FRANCE
DUCHESSE  D’ANGOULÉME
Née le 19 Dec. 1778






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Louis XIV investing the infant Duke of Burgundy with the blue ribbon of the Order of the Knights of the Holy Spirit.

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The title is printed in French and Latin.




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MOREAU AND DESSOLES BEFORE HOHENLINDEN
Reconnaissance dans la Neige.  *  Reconnaissance in the Snow
By Jean Louis Ernest Meissonier (1815-1891)    
Signed “Meissonier  1876"

Unframed and unprotected. 
Very badly damaged with severe water staining 
and black mold growth.
The overall mount measures 23¾ x 26¼ inches.
The actual engraving measures 14¼ x 17 inches.

Along the top edge of the print reads: 
London. Published June 2 1893 
by Arthur Tooth & Sons, 5 & 6 Haymarket, S.W. 
Copyright Registered.

Entered according to Act of Congress in year 1893 
by British Art Publishers Union Limited, 
New York and Messrs. Steifbold & Company, Berlin. Printed by A. Salmon and Ardail, Paris.

The print is not recorded in the three Inventory’s of Contents previously referred to.

The actual print remains undamaged and could be saved, remounted and re framed.

The original work by Meissonier is in the National Gallery, Dublin.




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SURPRISE AU PETIT JOUR
Surprise attack in the suburbs of Metz
 By Arthur de Neuville  1873

    Peint par A. de Neuville                                                Photogravure Goupil & Co.
Imprimé & Public par GOUPIL & Cre. Editeuts.
Paris  -  London  -  Le Haye
    Berlin-Verlag Von Goupil & Co.   New York Published by Boussod Valadon & Co.

Engraving 6½ x 10 inches  *  Unframed, unprotected, undamaged.
Printed on paper 8½ x 11½ inches  -  Mounted on card 14 x 18 inches.

*

The Siege of Metz, (close to the French border with Germany and Luxembourg), commenced on 3 September 1870 and ended the following month
       in a crushing defeat for the French            on 23 October.

After being defeated at the Battle of Gravelotte, six miles west of Metz on 18 August 1870, French Marshal Françoise Achille Bazaine retreated into the defences of Metz where he was besieged by the Prussian Second Army under the command of Prince Friederich Karl. The French attempted to break the siege but were repulsed. In a desperate bid Marshal Mac-Mahon was ordered to reinforce Marshal Bazaine but was trapped and destroyed at the Battle of Sedan. Bazaine was forced to surrender his entire army of three marshals, 6,000 officers, 173,000 men and all weapons, including 622 field guns and 300,000 rifles, on 23 October leaving Prince Friedrich Karl and his force of 134,000 free to attack the French in the Loire River area.

The original work, part of the series of sepia art prints titled “Episodes Militaires” published by Gouipil & Co., Paris, 
was reported sold in Paris for 6,200 francs in “The Athenæum” No. 3056, 22 May 1886.

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LADY BULLOUGH AND HER DAUGHTER, HERMIONE


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COLONEL WILLIAM STAVELEY GORDON
Royal Engineers 
Drawn by C. W. Walton, 103, Shaftsbury Avenue W., London.


Drawn by C. W. Walton.                   103, Shaftsbury Avenue W.    

PROOF                              W. Staveley Gordon.

London. Published by C. W. Walton, & Co., 103 Shaftsbury Avenue, W.
Charles William Walton was a draughtsman, lithographer and publisher.


The 10 x 13½ inch drawing by Charles Walton  is mounted on card measuring 16 x 22½ inches.

The lower half is in very poor condition having been stored directly onto a damp floor.

Colonel Gordon's decorations include: Egyptian Medal, Bronze Star, 4th Class Osmanieh and 2nd Class Medjidie Medals.

    Born on 16 March 1863, William Staveley Gordon was the seventh of ten children of Sir Henry William Gordon and Henrietta Rose Staveley. Educated at Cheltenham College and the Royal Naval College, Greenwich, in 1881 he received a commission in the Royal Marine Artillery and four years later into the Egyptian Army, before transferring from the Marine Artillery to Royal Engineers in 1887. Promoted Captain in 1891, Brevet Major in 1896, Major in 1900, and finally Brevet Colonel in 1904.
    Gordon served in the Sudan 1888-1889 and was wounded at Suakin. He saw action at Gamaizah and Toski and served in the expedition to Dongola in 1896, the Nile Expedition 1897 and at the Battle of Khartoum 1898.
    In the Battle of Omduman, 2 September 1898, Colonel Gordon commanded the twin screw, guide blade-gunboat, “Melik” built by the Chiswick shipyard of John I. Thornycroft. Along with two sister ships, the vessels were dismantled and shipped to Ismalia in Egypt, up the Ismalia Canal to the Nile and then south to Wadi Halfa on the Sudan frontier. Loaded onto railway wagons they were conveyed across the Nubian Desert to Abu Hamed. In the summer of 1898 they reached their destination at Abadieh, near Berber. 
Under the supervision of Major William Staveley Gordon, famously known as “Monkey Gordon”, a nephew of General Gordon, the three boats were reassembled and launched onto the River Nile where they joined a flotilla of seven older gunboats keeping the army lines of communication open.

  The Gunboat  “Melik” displaced 134 tons, was 145 feet long, 
with a beam of 24½ feet a draft of 2 feet and a speed of 12 knots. 
She was the vessel that brought Lord Kitchener down the Nile 
to save General Gordon at Khartoum, but arrived too late.


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A MYSTERY PICTURE

Printed on card measuring 14 x 19½ inches the image is badly scuffed and unprotected.
With its Satanic overtones the work is a "one off" in the Castle Collection.
There is no indication of artist or subject.

Can you throw light on this picture?






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POMONA

Giovanni Battista Cipriani, delin.          *           Francesco Bartolozzi, sculpt.

Now gathering what the bounteous year allows,
They pluck ripe cherries from bending bows.

Published as the Act directs Jan. 1 1787 by Jane White, No. 10 Little Newport Street.

Overall size 9½ x 10½ inches     *     Diameter of work 7 inches.
Badly torn edges, heavily water stained.
Pomona was one of a pair of stipple engravings by Francesco Bartolozzi
the other being “Ceres” which was either never part of the collection or has been lost.


Francesco Bartolozzi, 1725 - 1815, is undoubtedly England's most famous stipple engraver of the late 18th century. Studying art under Joseph Wagner in his native Venice, and Ignatius Hugford in Florence, Bartolozzi began his career engraving plates after the Italian masters.
    He was invited by King George III to come to London in 1764 to engrave the drawings of Guercino, Tibaldi and other Italian artists for the Royal Collection housed at Windsor Castle.     
    The new printing technique of stipple engraving was very much to the fore at this time and more than any other artist Bartolozzi mastered this subtle medium, created by using numerous flicks or dots rather than solid lines to create a more tonal composition, especially for figure studies and decorative subjects.
    In 1794 he was honoured by being appointed the first engraver to full membership of the prestigious Royal Academy.
    Bartolozzi’s success was widespread and in the last decades of the eighteenth century a large number of  English, French and Italian artists studied under and worked with him, including Luigi Schiavonetti, Peltro William Tomkins, Benedetto Pastorini and Giovanni Cipriani.


Giovanni Battista Cipriani, 1727 -1785, was born in Florence and ranks with Bartolozzi in the development of British graphic art in the late eighteenth century. Cipriani studied at the art school of Ignatius Hugford in his native Florence. In 1750 he went to Rome to complete his education, returning to Florence with a commission to paint for the Convent of Santa Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi.
   Cipriani came to England in 1755 where he was joined by his childhood companion Francesco Bartolozzi in 1764. The two began producing many great collaborative works of art which Cipriani designed and Bartolozzi and his pupils engraved. Cipriani developed a considerable reputation as a painter and archivist, restoring valuable paintings and murals by Rubens and Varrio. In 1768 he became a founding member of the Royal Academy and designed the institutions diploma.
   Giovanni Cipriani died at Hammersmith, London in 1785 aged fifty-eight and was buried in Chelsea. The monument in his memory was designed by his friend and colleague, Francesco Bartolozzi.

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THE TRANSVAAL WAR FUND 
FOR WIDOWS AND ORPHANS

Dedicated by Special Permission to 
Field-Marshall the Right Honourable Viscount Garnet Wolseley, K.P., G.C.B., G.C.M.G.
Commander-in-Chief of the British Army.

Personally signed in pencil on card mount by the artist: Harry Payne.



  and in ink by The Commander-in-Chief: 

Wolseley, F.M.


(Field Marshal Garnet Joseph Wolseley,
1st Viscount Wolseley, K.P., G.C.B., O.M., G.C.M.G., V.D., P.C., 1833 – 1913
was an Anglo-Irish Officer in the British Army.)

Overall size of card mount: 25½ x 31½ inches   *   Print size: 14 x 18½ inches

Printed in Munich. Published in London January 1st 1900 by Raphael Tuck & Sons, Ltd.
 for the benefit of the Transvaal War Fund for Widows and Orphans.

Badly damaged. Large tear from upper right of print. 
Card mount heavily water stained.

Totally unprotected.

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THOMAS  HOWARDUS  DUX  ET  COMES  NORFOLCÆ
THOMAS HOWARD   -   DUKE OF NORFOLK

        Print by Lucas Emil Vorsterman 1595 - 1675, Flemish artist and printmaker
After the German artist Hans Holbein the younger c.1497 - 1543.

Overall size including frame: 12 x 17 inches    Size of actual print: 7½ x 9½ inches.



The framed picture has been stored upside down in wet conditions resulting in extensive staining 
and  damage to the gilt edged frame. Over one third of the card mount and actual print suffer
 from black mold and irreparable damage through adhesion to the glass.
One wonders why the picture was ever taken down and stored in such a careless manner when, 
apart from the damage we see today, 
it would appear to have been in first class condition previously.


THOMAS HOWARDVS DVX-ET COMES NORFOLCIÆ, COMES SVRIÆ DNS HOWARD MOVBRAY SEGRAVE
BRVSE, COMES MARES CALLVS SVMɁ THESAVRARIVS ET ADMIRALLVS ANGLIÆ &c:


Cum privilegys Reg.       Hans Hollbain pinxit       Visitur in Ædibus Arondelianis Londini

                                                                                                                 Vorsterman fecit.
                                                                                          
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    Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk (1473 – 1554), succeeded to the title upon the death of his father in 1524 and played a major role in King Henry VIII’s government, 21 April 1509 – 28 January 1547.
    In the original painting by Holbein the Duke is depicted as Earl Marshal of England wearing the Order of the Garter with the St. George Pendant. He holds the baton of Earl Marshal and wand of Lord High Treasurer, a post he held from 1522 – 1547.
    In his engraving Lucas Emil Vorsterman has reversed the image; Howard is looking right and not left.
    The Duke’s first wife, Anne of York, was daughter of King Edward VII. The Duke himself was an uncle of Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard. He fought under his father against the Scots at Flodden in September 1513 after which he became Earl of Surrey. From 1513 – 1525 he served as Lord High Admiral and from 1520 – 1522 as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. A leading opponent of Thomas Cromwell (lawyer and statesman who served as chief minister to King Henry VIII  from 1532 to 1540, executed in 1540), the Duke was imprisoned by King Henry on charges associated with the disgrace of his son, Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, who was executed in 1547. Suspected of treason himself, the Duke was due to be executed but the King died on 28 January 1547 before he could sign the order. Thomas Howard remained incarcerated throughout the reign of Henry’s son, King Edward VI, 1547 – 1553 and was finally released and his estates and title restored by Queen Mary, a devout Catholic, who reigned from 1553 to 1558.

    Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, died at Kenninghall, Norfolk, on 25 August 1554 aged eighty and is buried at St. Michael’s Church, Framlingham, Suffolk.
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    Hans Holbein the Younger was a painter, draughtsman and designer of woodcuts, glass-paintings, metal work and jewelry. Son of Hans Holbein the Elder, he was born in 1497 in Augsburg, Germany, and initially trained under his father. Aged eighteen he went to Basel, Switzerland, where he was apprenticed to Swiss artist Hans Herbster alongside his elder brother, Ambrosius. In 1519 he was enrolled in the painters’ guild of Basel and the following year set up his own workshop in the town.
   He painted altarpieces, portraits, and murals and made designs for woodcuts, stained glass, and jewelry. Among his patrons was Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, (Erasmus of Rotterdam), a Catholic priest, and Dutch Renaissance humanist, who had settled in Basel in 1521.
     Holbein gave up his workshop in Basel in 1526 and went to England, with a letter of introduction from Erasmus to English lawyer, social philosopher, author, statesman and noted Renaissance humanist Sir Thomas More, who "received him warmly". Holbein quickly achieved fame and financial success and in 1528 he returned to Basel, where he bought property and received a number of commissions.
     Leaving his family in Basel, in 1532 he returned to England and settled permanently in London, where he was patronised by King Henry and leading figures of society.
    Holbein's work is characterised by superb technical skill, an unerring sense of composition, a sound grasp of the three-dimensional form and space, and a sharp eye for detail. His portraits are painted with a passion for objectivity, the outward appearance of his subjects directly reflecting their inner character or mood. His drawings, frequently executed in black and colored chalks are precise and controlled.
     Holbein died in London in 1543 aged fifty-six.
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Lucas Vorsterman (c.1595–1675) was a Baroque engraver who worked with artists Peter Paul Rubens and Anthony Van Dyck.

    Born in the Netherlands at Zaltbommel c.1595 Vorsterman joined Rubens' workshop being his principal engraver. With a specific idea of the style he wanted Rubens was a demanding employer of engravers: “As he dismissed engraver after engraver, he drove the best one, Lucas Vorsterman, into a nervous breakdown”.
    In 1621 a violent dispute arose between Vorsterman and Rubens, the cause is unknown but it is assumed it centred on ownership of author rights to the prints engraved by Vorsterman on the basis of Rubens' designs. The dispute ended their working relationship.
    In 1624 Vorsterman went to England and enjoyed the patronage King James I and nobility. Returning to Antwerp in 1630 he was one of the printmakers selected to engrave plates for Anthony Van Dyck’s Original Etchings and Iconography, executing twenty-two of the original eighty plates.

    Vorsterman lost his sight in old age and lived on the support of the Antwerp Guild of St. Luke until his death in 1675 aged eighty.


>+<  >+<  >+<  >+< 


So, what happens next - 
restore it or lose it?

DON'T TRUST TO OTHERS

MAKE YOUR CONCERNS KNOWN


REMEMBER -
DON'T LEAVE IT TO OTHERS !
WHEN ITS GONE, ITS GONE !

Don’t let Britain and Scotland's heritage slip away 
through indifference -






REVIEWED AND UPDATED BY GEORGE W. RANDALL
3 MAY 2024

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