Van de Velde. Album of original drawings of England, Italy, France and Switzerland. c.1850s-80s

VAN DE VELDE, CHARLES WILLIAM MEREDITH

Album of drawings of England, Italy, France and Switzerland, c.1850s-1880s

Oblong folio (298 x 425mm.), 81 drawings on 73 leaves, one large photograph on card of Van de Velde (320 x 265mm.), the drawings comprising 10 watercolours over pencil and 71 pencil sketches, late nineteenth-century blindstamped roan, gilt edges, some spotting

This album contains 13 watercolours or pencil sketches of England, including 7 views in the Lake District (of Windermere, Derwentwater, Keswick, and Borrowdale), one of Shrewsbury, and one of Clifton; 37 of Italy, including Naples, Capri, Positano, San Martino, Lugano, Lake Como, and Lake Garda; 13 of France, including Nice, Cap d'Antibes, Grasse, Menton, and Villefranche-sur-Mer; and 16 of Switzerland and the Alps.

Van de Velde (1818-1898) was a Dutch naval officer, artist, cartographer, honorary member of the Red Cross and missionary. He spent much of his early naval career in the Dutch East Indies between 1838 and 1847; after working as a missionary in South Africa, he travelled in Greece, Palestine and Syria between 1851-52, after which time he travelled widely in Europe where he produced the drawings in this album. See also lots 221 and 243.