Vue de Callao, Pérou

Location

Country: Peru
City: Lima
Place: British Embassy

French admiral Auguste-Nicolas Vaillant led a voyage in the corvette (small warship) ‘La Bonite’ from 1836 to 1837, during which time he cruised the Pacific and Indian Oceans chiefly to protect French merchant and whaling-vessels. However, it was also a scientific expedition and Vaillant carried on board the naturalists Joseph Fortuné Theodore Eydoux and François Louis Auguste Souleyet, French naval officer and watercolourist Théodore-Auguste Fisquet and watercolourist Barthélémy Lauvergne.

‘La Bonite’ visited Brazil, Uruguay, Chile and Peru, before crossing the Pacific to the China coast. The two artists provided botanical illustrations for the scientists and also produced topographical views of the locations they visited. Accounts of the circumnavigation and the scientific findings were issued in several volumes under the title ‘Voyage autour du monde execute pendant les annees 1836 et 1837 sur la corvette La Bonite’ and included over 100 plates after drawings by Fisquet, Lauvergne and others.

Draughtsman and painter for the French Navy Barthelemy Lauvergne was born in Toulon, southern France, on 7 April 1805. He trained under painter and illustrator Pierre Letuaire. Lauvergne began his career as secretary to Captain Dumont d'Urville aboard the ‘Astrolabe’, from 1826 to 1829. He was also secretary to Cyrille Pierre Théodore Laplace and draughtsman aboard ‘La Favorite’ from 1830 to 1832 and was painter on ‘La Bonite’ during its circumnavigation under French admiral Auguste Nicolas Vaillant (1838-49). Lauvergne’s paintings were shown at the Salon in Paris. He died in Carcès, Var, southeastern France, on 16 November 1871.

Places

Callao, Pacific Ocean, South America, Peru

Subjects

rowing boat, topography, seascape/coastal scene, mountain, wave, house, sailboat, ship, oar

Materials & Techniques

lithograph, coloured lithograph

Artist

Barthelemy Lauvergne (1805 - 1875)
Leon Jean Sabatier ( - 1887)
Adolphe Jean Baptiste Bayot (1810 - 1866)

Title

Vue de Callao, Pérou

Date

1841-1852

Medium

Coloured lithograph

Acquisition

Purchased from Spink & Son, November 1950

GAC number

1182