Lefevre James Cranstone

Lefevre James Cranstone
Photograph of Lefevre James Cranstone, c.1859
Born (1822-03-06)March 6, 1822
Hemel Hempstead, UK
Died June 22, 1893(1893-06-22) (aged 71)
Brisbane, Australia
Resting place Toowong Cemetery, Brisbane
Nationality British
Alma mater
Known for Landscape paintings and sketches
Movement Genre art
Spouse(s) Lillia Messenger

Lefevre James Cranstone (March 6, 1822 – June 22, 1893) was an English artist known for his watercolor genre-style landscapes and oil paintings. He visited the United States, where many of his works are displayed, and later moved to Australia.

Early life

Cranstone was the second of thirteen children born in Hemel Hempstead, England to Joseph, Jr. and Maria Lefevre Cranstone. In 1838 he enrolled in Henry Sass's School of Art in London and at age 18 was received as a probationer into the Royal Academy School on April 21, 1840. Following his formal training he exhibited a number of oil paintings in the annual exhibitions of the Royal Society of British Artists in Suffolk Street and at the Royal Academy. In addition to his watercolor and oil paintings, during his lifetime Cranstone also produced etchings and pen and ink and chalk drawings. He was also an art teacher in his wife Lillia's boarding school.

Visit to America

The Ohio River near Wheeling, West Virginia - watercolour, 1859–60 (Metropolitan Museum of Art)

Despite exhibiting at prestigious institutions such as the Royal Academy, Cranstone did not achieve popular recognition in Britain, and he is best known for his prolific work in America. For a ten-month period in 1859 and 1860 Cranstone, with his younger brother Alfred, visited cousins in Virginia and Indiana. During this trip he prepared almost 300 pen and ink with wash sketches documenting both the rural and urban areas of antebellum America which they visited. Works include paintings of the Ohio River at Wheeling, West Virginia, the White House in Washington DC and the Courthouse in Colonial Williamsburg. [1]

Later life

On July 12, 1882 Cranstone's wife, Lillia, died. Shortly afterwards, Cranstone and two of his children, Beatrice Lillia and Frederic George, joined his third son, William, now a medical doctor, and his new wife, Ellen Kent, in moving to the small town of Clermont, Queensland, Australia. Here, Cranstone continued his paintings of the local land and seascapes. In 1889 he moved with Beatrice to Brisbane where he continued drawing local subjects up to his death on June 22, 1893.

Works

Today, Cranstone's paintings can be found in the art collections of the White House;[2] the Metropolitan Museum of Art;[3] the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston;[4] the Virginia Historical Society; the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation; the Oglebay Institute Mansion Museum in Wheeling, W. Virginia; the Dacorum Heritage Trust, Berkhamsted, England;[5] and a number of other institutions and private collections. A collection of the art he prepared in Australia along with a volume of illustrated poetry verse brought with him from England can be found at the John Oxley Library in Brisbane.[6]

The sketches he made during his American visit became available for sale in 1928 and are at the Lilly Library at Indiana University.[7] In 1933 another collection of 98 larger watercolor versions of a representative number of these sketches were sold at auction. One painting from this time was the oil Slave Auction, Virginia which hangs in the Virginia Historical Society.[8] Donald L. Smith's biography contains a facsimile of this painting along with a letter written by Cranstone to the Hemel Hempstead Gazette dated December 29, 1860 on the election of President Lincoln and the horrors of slavery.

References

  1. ↑ "Lefevre Cranstone". www.dacorumheritage.org.uk. Dacorum Heritage Trust. Archived from the original on 10 May 2018. Retrieved 10 May 2018.
  2. ↑ "Asset Bank - Search Results". The White House Historical Association. Retrieved 18 September 2015.
  3. ↑ "Lefevre James Cranstone". The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, USA. Retrieved 18 September 2015.
  4. ↑ "Lefevre James Cranstone". Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Retrieved 18 September 2015.
  5. ↑ "New Civic Centre display puts the spotlight on creative artists of Dacorum's past". Berkhamsted & Tring Gazette. 29 September 2013. Archived from the original on 10 May 2018. Retrieved 10 May 2018.
  6. ↑ "Lefevre James Cranstone 1822?-1893". State Library of Queensland. Retrieved 18 September 2015.
  7. ↑ "Cranstone Sketches Mss". Lilly Library. Retrieved 18 September 2015.
  8. ↑ "Slave Auction, Virginia, by LeFevre Cranstone, c. 1860s". Virginia Historical Society. Retrieved 18 September 2015.

Further reading

  • Buteux, Elizabeth. Lefevre James Cranstone: A Victorian Quaker Artist, Berkhamsted, England: Dacorum Heritage Trust, 2007. ISBN 978-0953941445.
  • Smith, Donald L. Lefevere James Cranstone: His Life and Art, Richmond, Virginia: Brandylane Publishers, Inc, 2004. ISBN 978-1883911607.
  • Smith, Donald L. Illustrated Poetry Verse by Lefevre James Cranstone (1822-1893), Williamsburg, Virginia: Historic Research Services, 2007. ISBN 978-0615179469.
  • 2 paintings by or after Lefevre James Cranstone at the Art UK site
  • "Lefevre James Cranstone (1822 – 1893)". AMERICAN GALLERY - 19th Century. 19 January 2017. Archived from the original on 10 May 2018. Retrieved 10 May 2018.
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