Venice in London
1920
Medium
oil on canvas
Measurements
52.4 × 44.2 cm
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Felton Bequest, 1928
© Lt Col Simon R Hearder on behalf of the heirs in copyright
Gallery location
Not on display
Artwork Details
Inscription
inscribed in brown paint l.r.: Dora. Meeson / 1920
Accession Number
3680-3
Department
Australian Painting
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of The Vizard Foundation
Frame
Original, by Rowley, London
Frame
The frame is a late working of the themes developed by Whistler and those closely influenced by his approach to framing; in particular we might look to the frames used by Mortimer Menpes. It reflects the integration of a number of historic framing elements: the simplified form of Italian cassetta frames, the rich textures of ripple mouldings from Dutch and German frames of the seventeenth century and the materials and tonalities associated with nineteenth-century Aestheticism. The frame is a rare example in the collection. The maker is identified by a small paper label on the reverse.1
Note
1 Notes on Rowley frames are found in Jacob Simon, The Art of the Picture Frame, pp. 22, 185. Another frame by this Rowley company, with the same label, can be found on Meyer Altson's Winged words (Portrait of the artist's wife) (1748-5).
An earlier company with the same name based in Manchester, made frames for Rossetti; see ‘Alastair Grieve: The Applied Art of D G Rossetti–1. His picture frames’, Burlington Magazine, vol. cxv, no 838, January 1973. See Ford Maddox Brown's The Entombment (209-2) with a Canaletto style frame by Charles Rowley.
Frame Details
Framemaker
Rowley
140–2 Church St., Kensington W8
Date
1920
Materials
The frame is built up from a number of simple wooden sections mitred at the corners and fitted together to appear as a solid section. The surface treatment of shallow wave and ripple patterns may be applied moulding, but this is not clear. The frame is gilded with silver leaf, which has been coated to appear as gold, but with traces of the silver giving a particularly cool tone to the colour. The slip is painted black, as is the reverse of the frame.
Frame Condition
The frame is in good original condition throughout.
Dimensions
72.0 x 64.0 x 2.0 cm; sight 51.0 x 43.0 cmMore Information
National Portrait Gallery