Thomas Patch

Commissioned as part of a set of four pictures by John Apthorp (1730–1772), Florence, on 1 January 1764, for 50 sequins;

By descent to Mrs. W.F. Apthorp, Monte Carlo;

Sasha Horsten, Monte Carlo;

By whose Estate sold, France, 2022;

When acquired by the present owner.

F.J.B. Watson, 'Thomas Patch: Notes on his life, together with a catalogue of his known works', in The Walpole Society, vol. 28, no. 100, Oxford 1940, p. 41, nos 38 and 39;

J. Ingamells, A dictionary of British and Irish travellers in Italy 1701–1800, New Haven and London 1997, p. 22.

Born in Exeter in 1720, Thomas Patch travelled to Rome in 1747 where he lodged with fellow British artists, including, it is later said, Joshua Reynolds (1723–1792). His talents eventually earnt him a place in the studio of Claude-Joseph Vernet (1714–1789), who is presumed to have taught him skills in landscape painting. These vedute both relate to known views of Naples or its environs by Vernet: one was previously with Charles Beddington, London,¹ and the other, which is thought to date to 1734–40, is in the Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp.²

The Beddington picture is very close to the present view that features a stone arch on the left-hand side. There are, however, more compositional differences, particularly in the figures in the foreground, between the Antwerp painting and the second work under current discussion, which depicts a lighthouse at centre. It is therefore tenable to suggest that Patch saw the Beddington picture while apprenticed to Vernet, while he likely only encountered variants of the Antwerp picture, or perhaps preliminary drawings produced in advance of that work's execution. Alternatively, the canvas that features a lighthouse may relate to another, similar composition by Vernet, that is unknown today.

Both a painter of landscapes and caricatures, Patch was later celebrated as one of the quintessential artists of the eighteenth-century grand tour. His scenes of Florence, the artist's home for just shy of thirty years, were particularly prized amongst British aristocratic milordi and remain popular with serious collectors of Italian view paintings to this day. This was, at least in part, owing to the patronage of Sir Horace Mann (1706–1786), British Envoy to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, who described Patch as a ‘genius’ and stated that ‘all his productions have merit’.³ Mann in fact hung four of his imagined harbour scenes in the style of Vernet, much like the present pictures, in his grand reception room, where they must have constituted a permanent exhibition of Patch's works to tempt English purchasers.⁴

Note on Provenance

These paintings were commissioned as part of a set of four works on 1 January 1764 by John Apthorp, in honour of his late wife Alicia (1739–1763), Mann's niece.⁵ Alicia had died suddenly in October of the previous year in Gibraltar, when the couple were travelling to Italy with their two daughters. In his diary, Apthorp noted: 'January 1st 1764 agreed with Mr. Patch for four landscapes the size of Sir Horace's in the great room, for 50 sequins to be done in three months.'⁶ One of the other pictures that originally belonged to this set was sold in these Rooms in 2017 for £52,500.⁷ The picture that seems to represent the fourth canvas was sold at Sotheby's New York in 2008 for $34,375.⁸

^In the following months, Apthorp travelled to Rome, where he encountered the young Angelica Kauffman (1741–1807) in July.⁹ He commissioned a family portrait of himself and his two daughters from the artist, which sold at Sotheby's New York in 2014 for $50,000.¹⁰

¹ Private collection; oil on canvas, 63.3 cm x 98.8 cm.; F. Ingersoll-Smouse, Joseph Vernet, Peintre de Marines 1714–1789, Paris 1926, vol. II, p. 48, no. 1246: an engraving after this work is reproduced on pl. CXXXI, fig. 288.

² Inv. no. 794; oil on canvas, 98 x 125 cm.; https://kmska.be/en/masterpiece/naples; F. Ingersoll-Smouse, Joseph Vernet, Peintre de Marines 1714–1789, Paris 1926, vol. I, p. 67, no. 441, reproduced on pl. XXXIX, fig. 90.

³ W.S. Lewis (ed.), Horace Walpole's Correspondence, New Haven 1967, vol. 23, p. 275.

⁴ Watson 1940, p. 23.

⁵ Watson 1940, p. 41.

⁶ Ms. diary, in private possession.

⁷ London, Sotheby's, 6 July 2017, lot 187, for £52,500; https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2017/old-masters-day-sale-l17034/lot.187.html.

⁸ New York, Sotheby's, 6 June 2008, lot 64, for $34,375; https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2008/old-master-19th-century-european-art-n08457/lot.64.html.

⁹ Ingamells 1997, p. 22.

¹⁰ New York, Sotheby's, 30 January 2014, lot 299, for $50,000; https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2014/old-master-paintings-n09102/lot.299.html.