Walmer Castle by Moonlight

Location

Country: Bahrain
City: Manama
Place: British Embassy

Henry Pether was a painter of townscapes and landscapes. He was one of a family of painters who specialised in moonlit scenes and painted in a similar style. The most famous member of the family was Henry’s father, Abraham Pether (1756–1812). Pether exhibited seven paintings at the Royal Academy between 1828 and 1862. He also showed his work at the Royal Society of British Artists in Suffolk Street (1833-1834 and 1855) and at the British Institution (1865). During his career he moved several times, living at addresses in Southampton, Camden Town and south London, probably to escape his creditors. In 1837, The London Gazette reported that Pether was an inmate of a debtor’s prison and described his profession as ‘Surveyor, Artist, Engineer, and Architect’. Difficulty in making a sufficient income from painting alone may have led him to experiment with other occupations and entrepreneurial projects. In 1839 he and ‘Alfred Singer, of Vauxhall’ were granted a patent for ‘improvements in the preparation and combination of earthenware or porcelain for the purpose of mosaic’. Mr Singer went on to exhibit mosaic tiles at the Great Exhibition of 1851 and a review of the exhibition mentions Pether as one of those responsible for ‘re-introducing this very beautiful kind of decoration’. Pether continued his attempts to supplement his career as an artist with further patents for architectural materials in 1864 and 1867 and a patent for a lamp globe in 1876.

Places

England, Walmer Castle, Kent, English Channel

Subjects

carriage, walking, topography, seascape/coastal scene, evening, horse, donkey, moon, shore, man, woman, girl, shawl, bonnet, child, path, gate, bollard, castle, wall, ship

Materials & Techniques

canvas, oil, oil painting

Artist

Henry Pether

Title

Walmer Castle by Moonlight

Date

1852

Medium

Oil on canvas

Dimensions

height: 60.00 cm, width: 120.50 cm

Acquisition

Purchased from the Jeremy Maas Gallery, July 1969

Inscription

sdbl; according to Maas Gallery records: inscribed, signed and dated '5 Nov 1852' on verso

Provenance

With Purnell, Daniell & Morell, Honiton, Cornwall; from whom purchased by J. S. Maas & Co. Ltd., London, on 21 March 1969; from whom purchased by the Ministry of Works in July 1969

GAC number

8532