Studio RT Ltd

Description

Henri Schafer We are delighted to offer for auction this extremely detailed and finely executed watercolour by the French artist HENRI SCHAFER, sometimes listed as Henry, who has signed the painting to the right and entitled 'Antwerp'. The painting depicts a street scene in Antwerp, Belgium with the spire of the Cathedral of Our Lady in the background. It is a busy street with the townspeople going about their business, a flower stall on the right and street sellers and shoppers everywhere. There is a covered wagon further down the street. The houses are gabled and some have turrets, the majority of houses having shops with awnings on the ground floor. It is a typical example of the detailed street and cathedral scenes favoured by this artist.

This is one of a pair of watercolours by this artist that we are currently listing.

HENRI SCHAFER (1833-1916) studied at l'Ecole Nationale des Beaux-Arts in Paris and painted town and city scenes and cathedral interiors in Belgium, Germany, Spain and France. He lived for part of his life in Islington, London (which is why he is often listed as Henry Schafer) and the townscape paintings of Henri Schafer are often misattributed to the British artist Henry Thomas Schafer and their biographical details are occasionally merged, most notably in Benezit. The catalogues of auction houses regularly confuse the two artists. Distinct biographical sketches may be found in Christopher Wood's Dictionary of Victorian Painters.

Doing this item description caused great difficulty and confusion for the reason above, as the signature identical to the one on this painting, is listed on findartinfo as belonging to Henry T. Schafer. After considerable research on the internet, and reading Christopher Wood's book we believe that the paragraph above is totally correct. Anyone wishing to check for themselves, may visit a site on google, created for someone from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which clearly sets out the differences.

To put it simply, as far as we can tell, HENRI SCHAFER painted all the townscapes and cathedral scenes that are attributed to Henry T. Schafer, as Henry T. Schafer was a genre, figure and still life painter and sculptor, who mainly painted young ladies in draperies in oil, as shown on artnet. Also on artnet, Henri Schafer has 292 auction listings for townscapes and cathedral scenes. They, at least, appear to have got it right, unlike some of the major London auction houses.

HENRI SCHAFER, does not appear to have exhibited his work, although his output was prolific, especially in his later years when, according to Christopher Wood, he fell into debt. When checking his auction prices, please note that his name is variously spelt as Schafer, Schaffer, Schaefer and Schaeffer and his Christian name can be Henry, Henri or Herman, but they are all townscapes or cathedrals. His oils achieve prices in the thousands and the watercolours in the middle hundreds.

The painting in mounted with washlines and is framed in a 7/8" gilt frame. It will be supplied wired and ready to hang.

Image size 17" x 13 3/8" - 43.2cm x 34cm

Frame size 25 1/2" x 21 1/8" - 64.75" x 53.65"

Medium Watercolours

Condition Excellent. No foxing or fading there is a very faint mark to the centre sky. The mounts and frame are in very good condition, with some slight age related wear to the sides of the frame not visible to the front.