- Museum number
- 1857,0520.139
- Description
-
View of St Augustine's monastery at Canterbury; taken from within monastery ruins, two seated figures sketching to left, central tower of Cathedral and two towers of St Augustine's gate visible in distance
Brush drawing in grey wash, with watercolour
- Production date
- 1750-1788
- Dimensions
-
Height: 234 millimetres
-
Width: 289 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- Binyon mistakenly describes this as a view of Lincoln, but the towers and the location of the ruins of St Augustine's monastery in Canterbury indicate that the inscribed location (the abbreviation 'St Austin') is correct.
The note attached to this drawing states that Captain Bray "in one night made so exquisite a drawing of the Fleet at Portsmouth when the King was there as occasioned his Majesty on seeing it to promote him - He took it in the day and sat up the whole night to finish it then desired that amiable man Sir Richard Spry to present him with said view in his Hand to His Majesty - The beautiful Black & White Dog at Cookham is also done by him." In October 1993, the Map Library purchased an anonymous watercolour of King George III reviewing the fleet at Portsmouth. Presumably Bray's view is still in the Royal Collection.
K Sloan, Noble Art 2000
According to the long inscription attached to the original mount of this drawing, it was presented to the young writer George Monck Berkeley (1763-1793) by Miss Anson as a keepsake when he was about to leave Canterbury: this must have been in 1775 when Berkeley left the King's School for Eton. Over a hundred years after Barlow's drawing of Kit's Coty, it illustrates how the English fascination with antiquities had altered in the intervening years. Both set the object of their view within the landscape conventions of their time, accompanied by appropriate figures; but Barlow's shepherd and his rustic companion have become young military gentlemen in Bray's watercolour. Barlow's monument represented an ancient but native religion before the Romans came to Britain, while the Roman-dominated religion represented by the monastery in the foreground of Bray's watercolour, is in ruins, and the strong towers of Canterbury Cathedral and St Augustine's gate, representing the unification of church and state, rise beyond the monastery's crumbling walls. By the time Bray painted his view, interest in ancient monuments had become the preserve of a handful of dedicated antiquarians whose main objective was to record them, while ruins of castles and church were monuments of a more recent and immediately-understandable past, which did not need to be measured and recorded but could serve a double use in a landscape as symbol as well as a picturesque element.
As we have seen, young gentlemen trained at Portsmouth, Greenwich and other military and naval academies were trained to survey, measure and draw fortifications as well as landscapes and coastal views which enabled officers to understand how to move through the elements within it. By the second half of the eighteenth century, drawing was also a 'polite' recreation, an accepted way in which a gentleman might usefully employ his leisure, and it is not surprising to find many young officers producing 'official' views of coasts, fortifications and prospects, which now survive in in map libraries and archives, as well as more picturesque landscapes drawn during their leisure time as souvenirs for themselves or gifts for others, or to be engraved as views for the armchair traveller as Charles Tarrant (cat. 83) and later military amateurs like Williamson (cat. 105) and Colebrooke (cat. 104) intended.
The inscription on this drawing records another by Bray of the King reviewing the fleet under the command of Sir Richard Spry at Portsmouth in 1773. Bray sketched it on the spot and sat up all night to finish it so that it might be presented to the King the following day 'as occasioned his Majesty on seeing it to promote him'. The drawing must be the one catalogued as 'anonymous' in the Royal Collection (Oppe, 1950, no. 721). Gabriel Bray was indeed promoted Lieutenant on 25 June 1773 and posted on board H.M.Y. Augusta. A drawing of a ruined castle in Cumberland (LB 2) and an oil of A ship hove down and burning off (National Maritime Museum) were the only other known works by Bray until the sale by his godson's descendants of an album of ninety-five drawings made on a voyage to the British colonies in Africa and Jamaica from 1774-75. Mostly watercolour, they include landscapes of Deal and Portsmouth, as well as figures studies of gentlemen and ladies, sailors and natives, and a self-portrait painting in his sketchbook in his cabin. His interest was more in the customs and costumes of the inhabitants of the places he visited, than in their topography, reflecting the changing attitudes of travelling amateur artists as the century progressed. Bray joined the repeat voyage in 1775-6 but after 1782 he was a Captain in the Customs House Service.
Literature: Catalogue of the sale at Sotheby's, 11 April 1991, lot 11.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
2000 May-Sep, BM P&D, 'A Noble Art', no.86
- Acquisition date
- 1857
- Acquisition notes
- The inscription accompanying this drawing indicates that it was given by Miss Anson [?] to George Monck Berkeley as a keepsake when they were both about to quit Canterbury 28th Jany: 1788.
1857,0520.65 to 441 all came from lots 731 to 754 of the McIntosh sale which were all (with the exception of lot 752) bought for the BM for a total of £14 8s. The prices of the individual lots are given in the Bill Book, but were small and so not entered here.
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1857,0520.139