William Henry Hunt, Peasant Girls, c. 1830-31

Peasant Girls

Private Collection

Watercolor and gum arabic heightened with bodycolor and with scratching out

15 1/4 X 11 in., 39 X 28 cm.

Signed, l.l., W. HUNT

 

Provenance:

Probably, London, Spring 1831, Society of Painters in Water-Colours;

Blackburn, England, Richard Haworth (dealer) (S) 6 July 1928 [Peasant Girls Resting, 15 1/2 X 11 1/2 in.] (P) £30 and again (S) 15 Nov 1928 (P) £32;

With Michael Bryan, London dealer;

(S) Salisbury, England, Woolley & Wallis, 6 March 2019, Lot 66 [as Resting by the Wayside, Sisters (P) £650* $854*

 

Exhibited:

Probably, Spring 1831, Society of Painters in Water-Colours, No. 333, as Peasant Girls

 

It appears that this is one of a group of watercolors which Hunt painted c. 1830-34 at Hastings, England. The standing girl strongly resembles the model shown in Meekness -- both girls appear to be of approximately the same age [although she looks slightly younger in this watercolor], both seem to be dressed in identical clothing, and both are depicted with earthenware jugs. Since Meekness is dated 1831 and, with its pendant, Sauciness, was exhibited at the 1831 Spring Exhibition of the SPWC, the present watercolor is very likely identical to the work entitled Peasant Girls in the same exhibition. Hunt painted few watercolors depicting two girls, and no other watercolor with an appropriate title was exhibited by the artist around this time. This additional evidence in support of this being the work exhibited in 1831 makes the identification almost a certainty.

Done