Description
The captions include the following dedications, as well as the coats of arms of these patrons:
“To his Grace Francis, Duke of Bedford, Marquis of Tavistock &c. &c. this View of Bloomsbury Square is with the greatest respect inscribed by his Graces obedient & obliged Servants Robr. Pollard & Fras. Jukes.” The coat of arms bears the motto “Che Sara Sara.”
“To the Right Honorable Francis Godolphin Marquis of Caermarthen, Baron Osborne &c. &c. this View of Hanover Square, from a Drawing, in his Possession, is with great respect inscribed by His Lordship’s obedient & obliged Servants, Robr. Pollard & Frans. Jukes.” The coat of arms bears the motto “Pax in Bello.”
Robert Thew was a British printmaker and engraver who rose from humble beginnings as the son of an innkeeper to become engraver to the Prince of Wales. Although not academically trained, he became skilled in the dot manner of engraving and in 1783 set up a shop in Hull, producing shop advertisement bills and cards. A plate after Gerard Dow caught the eye of the prominent publisher and printseller John Boydell, who employed him; Thew engraved at least 19 of the large plates for Boydell’s Shakespeare Gallery.
Trained at the Royal Academy in London, Edward Dayes was an English painter, draughtsman and printmaker. He is best known for his topographical watercolors, which he made for publications in the 1790s. However, he also produced drawings, oil paintings, etchings and aquatints ranging from large-scale history paintings to miniatures. Dayes was trained by his father in engraving and studied in the schools of the Royal Academy, where he began to exhibit in 1786, continuing to participate in exhibitions until his death. He became an exhibitor at the Society of British Artists and was elected a member in 1830. His mezzotints were highly esteemed, and he made engravings after the works of prominent contemporaries including Joshua Reynolds and J.M.W. Turner. He was also quite successful with his own compositions, including portraits and genre scenes. His sketches of the British landscape influenced the development of the English school of watercolor and Turner’s early drawings. He also served as draughtsman to the Duke of York. Dayes is also known for architectural views incorporating elegant figures, tinted over an assured pen-and-ink outline. Such works are in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum and the South Kensington Museum.
Robert Pollard and Francis Jukes were British engravers who produced many prints together, with Pollard doing the etching and Jukes the aquatinting, sometimes after Pollard’s own designs. Pollard began as a painter of landscapes and marine subjects, and went to London where he became an engraver to the book trade. He was established as a publisher by 1779, issuing a wide range of decorative, patriotic and topographical prints. He made a number of fine line engravings after paintings by Robert Smirke. Jukes chiefly produced topographical prints in engraving, etching and, most notably aquatint, at which he was particularly skilled. In addition to many works after Edward Dayes and John Gilpin, his notable productions include Walmsley’s Views in Ireland and Nicholson’s Views in England.
Condition: Each very good with the usual overall toning and wear. Some minor abrasions and wear neatly restored as professionally laid on supporting sheet.
References:
Redgrave, Samuel. A Dictionary of Artists of the English School: Painters, Sculptors, Architects, Engravers and Ornamentists. London: Longmans, Green, and Col., 1874. (Dayes, 114; Jukes, 235; Thew, 406)
“Robert Pollard.” Grove Dictionary of Art, Macmillan, 2000, http://www.artnet.com/library/06/0684/T068475.asp (4 August 2004).
