Academy Fine Paintings

Description

This is a very large fine 19th century oil on canvas depicting cattle watering at the riverside in an extensive mountainous summer landscape ‘Near Betwys-y-Coed, North Wales’ by the important Victorian landscape painter Sidney Richard Percy (1822-1886). The painting is signed by the artist and dated 1873. It hangs in a very good Louis XV style swept giltwood frame, and sold with gallery receipt from 1990 for £40,000.

As with all of the original antique oil paintings we sell it is offered in the very finest condition it can be for its age, having just been professionally cleaned and re-varnished.

Sidney Richard Percy was the fifth son of the celebrated English landscape painter Edward Williams (1781-1855), one of the most famous families in British art history. In my opinion Sidney Richard Percy was its most gifted painter. Just as his brothers Henry John Boddington (1811-1865) and Arthur Gilbert (1819-1895) had done, Sidney Williams changed his name in order to distinguish himself from the other members of the Williams family.

Between 1842 and 1886 Percy exhibited at all the leading Victorian art venues showing 76 paintings at the Royal Academy, 48 at the British Institution, and 73 with the Royal Society of British Artists at the Suffolk Street Gallery. Today, landscapes by S.R. Percy are in great demand and sell at Sotheby’s and Christie’s, and through many of the world’s most important fine art dealers.

Dimensions: (framed) 116cm x 91cm (45½” x 36”)
Dimensions: (canvas only) 96cm x 61cm (38” x 24”)
Medium: Oil on canvas.
Provenance: 1990 sold by Mandell's Gallery, thence in private UK collection.
Presentation: Good 20th century Louis XV giltwood swept frame.
Condition: Excellent. Newly professionally cleaned and re-varnished. Ready to hang. We do not sell dirty, damaged or unframed works of art.
Conservation: Where necessary the paintings we sell are cleaned and restored by Fine Art Restoration (est.1974), or Simon Gillespie Studio, as seen on BBC Television's 'Fake or Fortune' and 'Britain's Lost Masterpieces'.

About AFP
Academy Fine Paintings is an international fine art dealership based in Buckinghamshire, England. We specialise in 19th century British and European oil paintings by some of the most important artists of the period, from Victorian landscapes and subject pictures to Belle Epoque portraits and Orientalist scenes.

Condition
Clients should always bear in mind that the vast majority of paintings we deal in are antiques - works over 100 years old and frequently older – and will therefore invariably retain some evidence of aging, historical damage and repair. During its lifetime a 150-year old oil painting may well have been exposed to extremes of heat or cold, intrusion of water, bumps, cuts and natural age-related deterioration, all of which require restoration. Whilst our conservator is one of the most eminent in the UK, no restorer can reverse time and every sign of ageing and natural deterioration, therefore anyone wishing to purchase a painting that looks like new should think about buying a new painting rather than an antique one.