Artist: David Cox Snr.(1783-1859)
Entitled: Bolton Abbey
Size: 18 x 26cm
Description: Watercolour, signed & Dated 1842
Price: sold
David Cox Snr. (1783 - 1859)
The freedom and atmosphere of his mature works made David Cox one a the most important of Victorian watercolourists. Encouraged in his painting by a cousin, he took drawing lessons from Joseph Barber, and began an apprentice with Fielder, a painter of lockets and trinkets. When Fielder committed suicide (circa 1800), he became a scenery painter at the New Theatre and, in 1804, travelled to London in the hope of finding similar work. When this came to little, he decided to become a watercolour painter.
He was helped in this decision by John Varley who, before 1808, gave him some lessons, though he had begun to exhibit landscapes at the Royal Academy as early as 1805. In this same period, he made his first journeys into Wales (1805, 1806), so establishing at the outset one of the most characteristic subjects. He soon became a notable contributor to the development of watercolour as a distinguished independent medium.
Exhibiting at the Associated Artists in Watercolour from 1809 (until its closure in 1812), he became both member and president in the following year. Then transferring allegiance to the Society of Painters in Watercolours, he rose almost immediately from position of associate to that of member. He worked for a brief period as drawing-master at Farnham Military College, and published drawing manuals, including A Treatise on Landscape Painting and Effect in Watercolours (1813-14).
He capitalised on this increasing range of subjects by exhibiting at new venues, the revived Birmingham Society of Artists (from 1829) and the Liverpool Academy (from 1831). He also rehearsed his extensive knowledge of Wales, in providing illustrations for Thomas Roscoe's Wandering and Excursions in North Wales (1836) and its companion on South Wales (1837).
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