Provenance

Sir Charles Clow Tennant, 1st bt.

British, 1823 - 1906

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In this painting, two young women are depicted sitting closely together. They are positioned side by side, with the woman on the left slightly leaning against the other woman and looking to the right, while the woman on the right looks out at us. Both women have pale skin and light eyes, and they wear neutral expressions. The woman on the left has curly brown-and-gray hair adorned with a light blue ribbon, while the woman on the right has her blonde hair styled under a cream-colored bonnet. Both are dressed in elegant, high-waisted white gowns tied at the waist with pale blue sashes. The woman on the left has her arm around the other woman's shoulders, and she holds a paper scroll in one hand. The woman on the right holds a large red folder filled with several white papers in her right hand, and she holds something small and gold in her other hand. On the left, a sleeping brown-and-white dog rests at their feet, nestled into the fabric of the women's skirts. Tall, dark trees are behind the women in the upper right corner, while the background in the upper left corner showcases a serene, hilly landscape featuring olive-green foliage and a distant view of a tall blue mountain under a partly cloudy light blue sky.
John Hoppner, The Frankland Sisters, 1795, oil on canvas, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, 1937.1.111

The Frankland Sisters

John Hoppner · 1795 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1937.1.111

This painting shows a seaside view with a low horizon. A sandy beach is on the left, with ships and sailboats sailing on the water in the distance on the right. From the beach on the left, a pier in the distance extends into the water, with people walking on it. There is a pink building on the beach near the end of the pier. Closer to us, near the bottom left corner, is a white horse tied to a cart with a person standing on it. The horse and person both face away from us, heading towards the pier. They are passing by a small wooden boat that lies in the sand on their left, connected by a rope to a dark red anchor submerged in the sand. The brushstrokes are smooth and detailed in the sky and sea. The color palette is dominated by pastel tones of beige, blue, and grey. The water is greenish-blue, with darker areas of shadow and light areas in the distance. The sky is blue, full of puffy white clouds that are tinged with light pink.
John Constable, Yarmouth Jetty, 1822, oil on canvas, Gift of Ruth Carter Stevenson in Honor of the Fiftieth Anniversary of the National Gallery of Art, 2016.115.1

Yarmouth Jetty

John Constable · 1822 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  2016.115.1

Butter-yellow clouds and water, a periwinkle-blue sky, and pale plum-purple buildings blend in hazy, indistinct bands across this horizontal landscape painting. The paint is thickly applied in some areas, especially along the top of the sky, and the scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes throughout. The blurry horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition and the small, round, white sun shines low in the sky to our left. The sky or clouds around the sun are painted with shades of pale sapphire-blue with touches of lavender, which give way to a lemon-yellow clouds or haze in the right two-thirds of the sky. Buildings along the horizon, deep in the distance across the right three-quarters of the canvas, are loosely painted with vertical swipes of heather pink and cream white. The water, closest to us, reflects the yellow of the sky with additional touches of celery green. Brown boats spaced along the harbor carry people and objects away from us, toward the town.
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Approach to Venice, 1844, oil on canvas, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, 1937.1.110

Approach to Venice

Joseph Mallord William Turner · 1844 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1937.1.110

A passenger boat, its bright tan sails reflecting the sun, careens among choppy water with at least eight more sailboats and a town along the water’s edge in the distance in this horizontal landscape painting. The water closest to us is muted slate blue, and it lightens as it extends to the horizon, which comes less than a quarter of the way up this composition. We look onto the long side of the passenger boat, at nine men, women, and children huddled in two groups there, in the lower center of the composition. The people wear black, white, red, or blue, and all seem to wear hats, though they are sketchily painted. Foamy, white crests lap at the long side of the tilted boat. Several larger ships with white sails unfurled float beyond to our left. To our right, seven flags and banners fly from a three-masted ship with its sails tied up. Two rows of more than a dozen black canons each poke through doors along the side we can see. It floats upright, closer to the distant town lining the water across the right half of the picture. The buildings are painted with strokes of white paint to create loose silhouettes. Loosely painted vertical strokes suggest more boats and ships lining the harbor. A bank of cream-white and some pale gray clouds fill most of the sky, breaking to reveal blue sky only in the upper right corner of the painting.
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Rotterdam Ferry-Boat, 1833, oil on canvas, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Collection, 1970.17.135

Rotterdam Ferry-Boat

Joseph Mallord William Turner · 1833 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1970.17.135

Bibliography

1901

  • "The Collection of Sir Charles Tennant, Bart." The Connoisseur 1 (1901): 7+.

1971

  • Dugdale, James. "Sir Charles Tennant: The Story of a Victorian Collector." The Connoisseur 178 (1971): 8-9, 12.