Alfred Rankley

Charles Jardein;
Christie's, London, 30 March 1962, lot 154 (bought Derek for 90 guineas);
Mrs Charlotte Frank, where bought by Sir David Scott, 16 July 1962 for £180.

London, Royal Academy of Arts, 1855, no. 1141;
Birmingham amd Midland Counties Art Union, 1856;
London, Agnew (in co-operation with the Victorian Society), Victorian Painting 1837-1887, 1961, no. 4;
Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada, Victorian Exhibition, 1965, no. 106;
London, Royal Academy of Arts, Bicentenary Exhibition, 1968-9, no. 17;
Edinburgh, National Gallery of Scotland, Sunshine and Shadow - The David Scott Collection of Victorian Paintings, 1991, no. 8.

Obituary notice for the artist, Art Journal, 1873, p. 44;
Christopher Wood, Victorian Panorama - Paintings of Victorian Life, London, 1976, pp. 42, 98, pl. 99;
John Hadfield, Every Picture Tells a Story: Images of Victorian Life, 1985, p. 81, illustrated p. 80;
Graham Reynolds, Victorian Painting, revised edition, London, 1987, pp. 110, 114, illustrated pl. 62;
Julian Treuherz, Victorian Painting, London, 1993, p. 110, pl. 79;
Christopher Wood, Dictionary of Victorian Painters, two volumes, Woodbridge 1995, vol. II, illustrated p. 370;
Sotheby's, Pictures from the Collection of Sir David and Lady Scott, 2008, pp. 70-71.

The following condition report has been provided by Hamish Dewar, an independent restorer who is not an employee of Sotheby's. STRUCTURAL CONDITION The canvas appears to be unlined and attached to a wooden keyed stretcher with one horizontal and one vertical cross-bar. The canvas visible from the reverse is most probably a dry lining canvas and an inscription is visible in the upper left quadrant (when viewed from the reverse). PAINT SURFACE The paint surface has an overall craquelure pattern all of which is stable and not uncharacteristic for an artwork of this age. Some paint shrinkage is also visible that seems to run in a vertical band down the painting approximately 17 cm from the left hand framing edge and 10 cm in width. Inspection under ultraviolet light reveals an extremely thick, opaque and discoloured varnish layer. A few small lines of retouching can be seen on the back of the woman, covering fine lines of paint separation. There are other small lines in the composition. It is unclear as to whether the deteriorated varnish layers may be concealing previous restoration work. Areas of pentimenti by the artist are visible , such as the woman's hand and profile. SUMMARY The painting therefore appears to be in stable condition and cleaning and revarnishing, though not necessary for reasons of conservation, may be found to be beneficial. Hamish Dewar Ltd, 13 & 14 Mason's Yard, Duke Street, St James's, London SW1Y 6BU Tel: +44 (0)20 7930 4004 Fax: +44 (0)20 7930 4100 Email: hamish@hamishdewar.co.uk
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

'It tells the tale of two schoolfellows who have drifted apart. One has proposed (I suspect he was always comfortably off, he looks so sleek) and the other, foolish enough to have married without a job, has failed as an author, is poverty stricken and has to live in what is not much better than a garret and has fallen sick. His schoolfriend somehow heard of his plight and comes to help him. He finds him in bed (how pretty the counterpane so often are in Victorian pictures) his writing put aside, his medicine beside him and his wife looking after him. He slips him a £5 note - quite a considerable sum in those days and his friend falls against him weeping in gratitude. So that we should be quite sure what it is all about there is a copy of Cicero's "De Amicitia" on the floor; pretty heavy reading for an invalid, but never mind that. The tender attitude of his wife, the medicine on the table, the canary in its cage, the abandoned pen and paper, the gloomy view from the window and the prosperous schoolfellow smart shoed and impeccable attire are all pleasantly depicted.' Sir David Scott

Rankley's Old Schoolfellows shows the bedroom of a city house in which a man who lies sick and unable to work is visited by a friend from childhood. A series of carefully programmed clues allow the spectator to reconstruct the circumstances of this mission of kindness, according to the conventions of Victorian genre painting. The room itself is comfortably furnished - the floor is carpeted and the curtains of the tester are in place; there is a picture on the wall, and books placed on a chest of drawers; a writing table stands in front of the window on the room's far side; the patient's medicine and a glass and spoon rest on a side-table in the left-hand foreground. This is by no means the kind of squalid garret that awaited those who had failed in life absolutely, as seen for example in Henry Wallis's Death of Chatterton (Tate), of 1856. Furthermore, in Rankley's painting the person who is ill is attended by a young woman, presumably a loving wife, and has the moral and physical support of a friend. The subject of the painting therefore is less to do with the insecurity of life in the Victorian age, than the value of friendship, and in this particular case the loyalty that is felt between those who have spent their adolescence together.

The theme of the constancy of friendship was supported by the quotation from the Book of Proverbs that accompanied the work when first exhibited. On the floor beside the sick-bed is the book which has perhaps been put down at the moment of the friend's arrival, Cicero's De Amicitia (On Friendship), giving further clarity to the message that the painting is essentially to do with the bonds of loyalty that must ensure that individuals care for one another in adversity. If the sick man is too ill to work (there is a suggestion that he is himself a writer and therefore utterly dependent on the efforts of his own pen), his upstanding and apparently prosperous friend will come to his rescue. The two friends clasp one another's hands. At the same time, the visitor holds a banknote which will presumably be passed secretly to the woman.

Graham Reynolds found in Old Schoolfellows 'that clarity of anecdote and simplicity of moral appeal which was the strength [...] of mid-Victorian subject painting' (Painters of the Victorian Scene). Rankley, who had been trained at the Royal Academy Schools and who exhibited at the Royal Academy and British Institution from the 1840s and until the early 1870s, was known for his genre subjects and literary themes. His obituarist praised his works, which were always 'carefully painted', on the grounds that 'the story, whatever it may be, is attractively set out; and for the most part conveys some good and wholesome moral, and without any forced or vapid sentiment' (Art Journal, 1873, p. 44).