Newgate Prison

Location

Country: UK
City: London
Place: Government Art Collection

James Miller was the son of Johann Sebastian Müller (c.1715-c.1790), a watercolour painter of flowers and an engraver, born in Nuremberg. Müller moved to England in 1744, changing his name to John Miller. His son James also became a watercolour painter, but was best known for his views of buildings in London and landscapes made in the surrounding area. The figures in James Miller’s works were criticised as ‘rather out of scale and badly drawn’ in H. L. Mallalieu’s ‘Dictionary of British Watercolour Artists’ (1976). Miller exhibited at the Society of Artists of Great Britain from 1773 to 1791 and at the Royal Academy from 1781 to 1788.
Engraver and draughtsman Thomas Medland lived in Westminster. He is included in a drawing by A. E. Chalon titled ‘Students at the British Institution’ (1807), suggesting he studied there, although he may have been a teacher. He engraved illustrations for ‘Robinson Crusoe’, after drawings by Thomas Stothard and also became known for his topographical aquatints. Medland was also a watercolour painter and exhibited his watercolours at the Royal Academy. The original watercolour for the ‘West Front of the East India Company College’ was exhibited at the Academy in 1808. Medland died at his home near Haileybury College in Hertford at about the age of 68. Nothing is known of his wife, but his will divided his estate between three children.

Places

England, London

Subjects

carriage, cart, topography, townscape/cityscape, horse, smoke, boy, man, woman, street, bollard, prison, cathedral, dome, cobbles, chimney

Materials & Techniques

engraving

Artist

James Miller
Thomas Medland

Title

Newgate Prison

Date

published 15 April 1800

Medium

Engraving

Acquisition

Presented by Dr. Peter Rusk, November 1971

Inscription

NEWGATE PRISON &c [below image and lettering in pencil, either side of armorial]

GAC number

9533