A Graduate of Pomona
William Henry Hunt, Bushey Church from the Southwest, c. 1822-1825
Bushey Church from the Southwest
New Haven, Connecticut, Yale Center for British Art, No. B1975.3.1040
Ink and watercolor
7 3/4 x 12 3/4 in., 19.7 x 32.4 cm.
Inscribed in gray ink, on back, upper left: "Wm Hunt. | (Collectn of Capt. Spencer Churchill)"
From the outset, William Henry Hunt excelled as a draftsman and colorist. John Varley, to whom Hunt was apprenticed commented favorably on Hunt's abilities as a colorist, and by the end of the artist career, the influential art critic, John Ruskin, went so far as to identify Hunt's work as the only work to which budding artists should turn for examples of coloring.
This early watercolor by Hunt demonstrates his talent at depicting traditional landscape subjects with the then prevalent watercolor techniques, i.e., inked outlines with transparent washes of watercolor. If Hunt had not been unable to endure the physical strains inherent in painting plein air landscapes, he would certainly have achieved a great deal of fame and success, but, in my opinion, the world was fortunate that the artist's physical limitations turned him toward new, innovative subject matters and painting techniques, many of which literally changed the course of English and Continental painting by the latter 19th century.
William Henry Hunt, Bushey Church from the Southwest, c. 1822-1825
Bushey Church from the Southwest
New Haven, Connecticut, Yale Center for British Art, No. B1975.3.1040
Ink and watercolor
7 3/4 x 12 3/4 in., 19.7 x 32.4 cm.
Inscribed in gray ink, on back, upper left: "Wm Hunt. | (Collectn of Capt. Spencer Churchill)"
From the outset, William Henry Hunt excelled as a draftsman and colorist. John Varley, to whom Hunt was apprenticed commented favorably on Hunt's abilities as a colorist, and by the end of the artist career, the influential art critic, John Ruskin, went so far as to identify Hunt's work as the only work to which budding artists should turn for examples of coloring.
This early watercolor by Hunt demonstrates his talent at depicting traditional landscape subjects with the then prevalent watercolor techniques, i.e., inked outlines with transparent washes of watercolor. If Hunt had not been unable to endure the physical strains inherent in painting plein air landscapes, he would certainly have achieved a great deal of fame and success, but, in my opinion, the world was fortunate that the artist's physical limitations turned him toward new, innovative subject matters and painting techniques, many of which literally changed the course of English and Continental painting by the latter 19th century.