Richard Redgrave RA, Four compositional sketches for 'The Reduced Gentleman's Daughter', c. 1840.
Pen and ink on wove paper. 113 mm x 127 mm. © Photo: Royal Academy of Arts, London.
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Four compositional sketches for 'The Reduced Gentleman's Daughter', c. 1840
Richard Redgrave RA (1804 - 1888)
RA Collection: Art
A sheet featuring four small compositional sketches in pen and ink for 'The Reduced Gentleman's Daughter'. Redgrave painted this scene illustrating a passage from The Rambler and exhibited it at the Royal Academy in 1840. He later produced a print which was engraved by Richard Hatfield and published on 10 April 1842.
Here the artist has experimented with placing the figure of the daughter (wearing black) on the left or the right. The contrast of light and shade seems to have been the artist's preoccupation in many of the compositional sketches in the album as is clear from these drawings and the accompanying inscription.
A set of preparatory drawings for 'The Reduced Gentleman's Daughter' in an album of Redgrave's works (16/1281). These include small compositional sketches in pen and ink and a more detailed colour study.
The scene is one that Redgrave painted and exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1840 though the original painting is now untraced. The composition was also engraved by Richard Hatfield (example in the V&A) and published in 1842.
The subject is derived from an episode in Samuel Johnson's The Rambler in which 'a poor lady seeks for a situation, and is cruelly received by her would-be employer'.
Object details
113 mm x 127 mm
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