Object Number 1959.0074.009 A

Object Name

Print (Mezzotint)

Title

Spring.

Category

Prints and Maps

Credit Line/Donor

Museum purchase

Creator (Role)

Richard Purcell (Mezzotinter)
c.1736-c.1766
References: Chaloner Smith, British Mezzotinto Portraits, vol. 3, p. 1008.

Robert Pyle (Painter)

Robert Sayer (Publisher and seller)
1725-02//1794
Sayer became active as a printseller as early as the late 1740s. He built up his stock of copper plates by taking over others’ inventories, first Philip Overton, then James McArdell when he died in 1765. He worked in partnership with John Bennett from around 1774 to 1785, then operated alone again through 1793. When he died in February 1794, the firm (along with Sayer’s stock of plates) were taken over by another London print firm, Laurie & Whittle.

Place of Origin

London, London, England, United Kingdom, Europe

Date

1755-1765

Mark or Signature or Inscription or Label

1. Inscription; Lower left beneath image; R. Pyle Pinx.\t
2. Inscription; Lower right beneath image; Cha.\s Corbutt Fecit.
3. Inscription; Bottom center; London; Printed for & Sold by Rob.\t Sayer, Map & Printseller, at the Golden Buck, near Serjeants Inn, Fleet street.

Subjects

Allegory; Genre scene; Seasons

Materials

Ink; Paper (laid)

Techniques

Mezzotint with etched line and roulette work, Hand colored, Painted

Dimensions (inches)

14.4 (H) , 10.3 (W) , 12.4 (Image H) , 9.9 (Image W)

Dimensions (centimeters)

36.5 (H) , 26.2 (W) , 12.4 (Image H) , 9.9 (Image W)

Measurement Notes

H at left. W at bottom. Plate H: 13.9 in. (35.4 cm). Plate W: 10.0 in. (25.4 cm). Chain intervals: 2.8-3.0 cm; 9 laid lines per cm.

Publisher Summary

Sayer, Robert

Place of Publication

Golden Buck, near Serjeants Inn, Fleet Street, London, England, United Kingdom, Europe

State

II or later

Watermark

none

Coloring

Hand colored with translucent and opaque watercolors

Edition Notes

Plate is very worn and reworked with etched lines and roulette work. Prints from this set appear to have been put together and possibly are of different states.

Object Description

Text available soon.

Bibliography and Bibliographic Notes

[Book] Fowble, E. McSherry. 1991 To Please Every Taste: Eighteenth-Century Prints from the Winterthur Museum.
• Published: no. 75, pp. 180-81.
[Book] Fowble, E. McSherry. 1987 Two Centuries of Prints in America, 1680-1880 : A Selective Catalogue of the Winterthur Museum Collection.
• Published: no. 147, p. 223.
[Book] Smith, John Chaloner. 1884 British Mezzotinto Portraits; Being a Descriptive Catalogue of These Engravings from the Introduction of the Art to the early part of the present century. 3. 941-1428.
• Listed under Purcell, no. 86, p. 1028.