Attributed to Maria Graham, later Callcott

This rare watercolor is accompanied by a label (now preserved on the reverse of the frame) which identifies the names of the people present, dates the work to 1822 and indicates that it was painted at ‘Gloria Cottage’.

Given the presence of the word ‘cammondongo’, which appears to be the nickname for the timid-looking boy of African descent on the right and which has been interpreted as a phonetic rendering of the Portuguese word for house-mouse: camundongo, it has been suggested that this watercolor was painted in the Gloria Hill area of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The work has been attributed to Maria Graham, a pioneering traveler, author, art historian and botanist who was in Rio at the end of 1821 and the first few months of 1822. In her journal, published in 1824 under the title Journal of a Voyage to Brazil, and Residence There, During Part of the Years 1821, 1822, 1823, she records spending time with her friends, the Mays, on Gloria Hill, describing it as 'green and wooded and studded with country houses'.¹ 

Graham was the eldest child of a Scottish naval officer, George Dundas, and his wife Ann. She led a full and fascinating life, travelling as far as India, Chile and Brazil as well as throughout much of western Europe. Her first husband died at sea in 1822, while they were en route from Brazil to Chile. Later, in 1827, she married the painter Augustus Wall Callcott R.A. and became ensconced within his artistic and literary circles. Her published work includes, amongst others, Journal of a Residence in India (1812), Memoir of the Life of Nicholas Poussin (1820), Three Months Passed in the Mountains East of Rome, During the Year 1819. 1820 (1821), A Short History of Spain (1828) and Little Arthur’s History of England (1835). The largest collection of her drawings is held at the British Museum, London.²

We are grateful to Dr. Jan Marsh for her help when cataloguing this lot. 

1. J. Hayward and M. Soleda, Maria Graham’s Journal of a Voyage to Brazil, Anderson, South Carolina 2010, p. 100

2. London, British Museum, inv. nos. 1845,0405.13.1-167