John Frederick Lewis, R.A.

George R. Burnett of South Lodge, Enfield (and sold: Christie's, London, March 16, 1872, lot 137)
Thomas Agnew & Sons, London
Charles P. Matthews, London (and sold: Christie's, London, June 6, 1891, lot 78)
William Vokins
Estate of E. M. Denny (and sold: Christie's, London, May 8, 1925, lot 144)
Gurr Johns
R. G. Campbell, Great Hollanden, Underriver, near Sevenoaks (and sold: Christie's, London, July 14, 1933, lot 42)
Holmes
Acquired by the present owner in 1989

 

London, Royal Academy, 1863, no. 158

Times, May 1863
Athenaeum, May 9, 1863, p. 623
The Reader, May 23, 1863, p. 511
Art-Journal, June 1863, p. 113
Fraser's Magazine for Town and Country, June 1863, p. 789
Athenaeum, April 21, 1900, p. 506
Athenaeum, March 14, 1908, pp. 328-9
Major General Michael Lewis, C.B.E., John Frederick Lewis, R.A. 1805-1876, Leigh-on-Sea, 1978, pp. 42, 53
Rodney Searight, "An Anonymous Traveller Rediscovered," Country Life, May 4, 1978, p. 1259
Kenneth Paul Bendiner, 'The Portrayal of the Middle East in British Painting 1835-60', Ph.D. diss., Columbia University, 1979, p. 218
"A Question of Identity," (Letter to the Editor), Country Life, June 21 1979, p. 2016
Mary Anne Stevens, ed., The Orientalists: Delacroix to Matisse, European Painters in North Africa and the Near East, exh. cat., London, 1984, p. 203
Scott Wilcox, ed., Edward Lear and the Art of Travel, exh. cat., 2000, p. 166
Emily M. Weeks, Cultures Crossed: John Frederick Lewis (1804-1876) and the Art of Orientalist Painting (forthcoming, Yale University Press), chapter 7 and passim

The following condition report was kindly provided by Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc.: This painting is in remarkable condition. The panel on which it is painted is made from a single piece of hard wood which is flat and unbroken. The paint layer is probably clean. There has been no abrasion to the extremely fine and complex technique by the artist and there appear to be no retouches, except on the very edges under the frame. There is one small spot of a waxy light substance in the lower right beneath the small box here. Clearly the picture is in lovely state.
"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."

In a letter to John Frederick Lewis dated May 10, 1842, Frederick William Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh, later fourth Marquess of Londonderry, wrote:

My dear Lewis,

According to our convention in conversation, I hope you will accept a commission to paint a picture for me of ourselves, a party, not including Mr. Schranz – you will exercise your own discretion as to place and persons and details – the price 200 guineas. . . . You must take your own time etc. but I am sure you will agree with me that the sooner the work is accomplished the better for all of us – Castlereagh.¹

Despite his patron's sense of urgency, Lewis did not complete the picture for fourteen years.  The prolonged delay, while understandable given the complexity of the work and Lewis's famously fastidious painting style, was not without its consequences: When the picture was exhibited at the Old Watercolour Society in 1856, the owner was listed not as Castlereagh, but as Henry Wallis, a noted art dealer.  

Castlereagh's rejection of the belated portrait was not mirrored by his contemporaries.  The famed art critic John Ruskin had 'no hesitation in ranking [A Frank Encampment] among the most wonderful pictures in the world'.²  In addition to the technical brilliance of the work – which occupied the critic's pen for several pages - Ruskin marveled at its profound message, and the clever symbolism that it contained:

Let us, however, recovering as best we may from our amazement at this toil, and this success, look for a little while at the meaning of the picture – meaning which we find indicated by the painter in the most subtle way. The hand of the principal figure droops negligently at its side, yet so as to point to an unfolded map.  The letters on this map are of course reversed, as it lies open rightly for its owner, therefore upside down to the spectator; but the title of it is carefully made legible –

'MAP OF'

'SYRIA,'

'ANCIENT AND MODERN.'

and the picture itself is a map of antiquity and modernism in the East – the Englishman encamped under Mount Sinai.

In 1862, Lewis painted this second, nearly identical version of A Frank Encampment.  This smaller work was exhibited at the Royal Academy the following year, where it again drew the attention of numerous critics.  The decision of the artist to replicate a composition was not unusual.  Lewis had made a habit in his mature career of reproducing his commercially successful Orientalist paintings in various mediums.³  In this case, however, there may have been additional, and more personal motivations: Just hours after viewing the watercolor version A Frank Encampment, Ruskin had expressed a pressing concern to the artist:

If it is firm colour – it will one day be a thing that men will come from India to see . . . I tell you this as a piece of information because after doing such a piece of work as that – you can hardly know yourself if it is right or wrong – I can't tell you how glorious I think it – Are you sure of your material – if one of those bits of white hairstroke fade – where are you? – Why don't you paint in oil only, now? ⁴ 

The impact of these remarks on Lewis was profound.  Two years after Ruskin's letter was written, the artist resigned as President of the Old Watercolour Society (he had achieved that distinction in 1855), and devoted himself to oils. 

Ruskin's concern over the fragility of A Frank Encampment surely compelled the artist to paint a second version, which would endure for years to come.  Compelling too was the fact that Lewis's own life, in many ways, paralleled the subject he portrayed.  After a period of international travel in the 1830s, Lewis arrived in Egypt in 1841.   He would remain there for a decade, living, in the words of his old friend William Makepeace Thackeray, the 'dreamy, hazy, lazy, tobaccofied life' of a 'languid Lotus-eater'.⁵  In Cairo, Lewis secured a grand Islamic house, several servants, and a talented Egyptian female cook (about whose other household roles Thackeray teasingly speculated).   European manners and customs were largely forgotten, as were the formalities of Victorian gentleman's attire.  Lewis now wore a 'handsome grave costume of dark blue . . . consisting of an embroidered jacket', and trousers which, Thackeray noted, 'would make a set of dresses for an English family'. 

Far from being a permanent fixture in the Egyptian metropolis, however, Lewis often ventured beyond its hustle and bustle.   He delighted in exploring the diversity of the landscape around him, and displayed an archaeologist's interest in Egypt's ancient historical sites.⁶  Indeed, and as Thackeray observed within a few moments of speaking with the artist, Lewis believed that 'the great pleasure of pleasures was life in the desert, - under the tents, with still more nothing to do than in Cairo; now smoking, now cantering on Arabs, and no crowd to jostle you; solemn contemplations of the stars at night, as the camels were picketed, and the fires and pipes were lighted'.  It is perhaps no coincidence, then, that the reclining figure in A Frank Encampment bears some resemblance to the 'languid' artist himself (fig. 1), ⁷ and that the subject was a recurring one within the artist's oeuvre. ⁸

Sheikh Hussein 'of Gebel Tor' (the Arabic name for Mount Sinai) stands just left of center in Lewis's composition, his entourage of camels and Bedouin companions behind him. ⁹ Whereas most of his men are content to mill about, rest, or converse with one another, three pay careful attention to the scene that is unfolding before them.  The standing figure just behind Sheikh Hussein clasps his hands around a long stick, head cocked with curiosity and eyes squinting against the sunlight to better see the exchange taking place; to his right, partially hidden by the startlingly erect head of a camel, a turbaned figure sits with ramrod-straight back and eyes trained forward; to his right, another seated figure in a simply arranged headdress pulls his knees close to his chest and watches with unconcealed captivation.

The Sheikh, clad in vibrant blue and red robes and an expertly wrapped white turban, maintains a respectful distance from a large party of European travelers, who have set up camp in his windswept domain.  His sandaled feet are carefully positioned at the edge of a colorful woven carpet spread upon the desert sand, indicating a polite but firm rejection of the Europeans' temporary quarters.  The Sheikh's rigid posture, as well as his loosely clenched hands, downcast eyes, and stern expression, suggest a growing impatience with the principal object of his attention – the very comfortably situated Lord Castlereagh.

Beside this reclining figure there is a hookah or pipe, freshly lit, and a forgotten cup of tea.  Books, newspapers, and a map are also at arm's reach.  Rather than English dress, Castlereagh has adopted the loose-fitting garb of an Arab traveler: he sports a red headscarf, a red paisley cummerbund, and red pointed slippers.  He wears a pale blue vest as well, with pale blue trousers that billow generously around his legs, recalling those that Lewis himself had worn.

Castlereagh's languor and sense of casual ease is exacerbated by the intensity of the activity around him.  His dragoman or translator gestures with his right hand and bends forward with animated enthusiasm, as he passes the Sheikh's most recent message along to his employer.  A Nubian slave nearly falls over the carefully laid table, straining forward from a half-seated position, so fascinated is he by the ongoing conversation.  One of Castlereagh's European companions sits nearby, eyes glued to the face of this black youth as he searches for any changes in expression that might betray the nature of the discussion at hand.  He has virtually forgotten the Arab man preparing his beverage, the only figure underneath the tent who seems oblivious to what is going on around him.  Behind this group is a second Nubian figure, as tall and erect as the tent pole beside him.  The position of his head is echoed by that of the small lap dog below.  This frisky pet is seated upon a cushioned folding wicker wooden chair and holds a riding switch in its mouth - a humorous and rather patronizing substitute, perhaps, for the one missing figure in Lewis's composition - Castlereagh's hired artist, Antonio Schranz.¹⁰

The identities of the remaining figures can be determined with some degree of certainty, thanks to Lewis's exhaustively descriptive title for the work and the existence of Lord Castlereagh's diary, published as a travel book in 1847.¹¹  Here, Castlereagh had described his excursion from Cairo to Palestine across the Sinai desert in mid-May, 1842.  His retinue had included Count von Pahlen, Mr. Tardrew (a physician), another companion named Stirling (perhaps a personal servant), and Mahmoud (a translator, or dragoman). The group spent five days encamped at Mount Sinai and on May 23, they were at the foot of St. Catherine's, under the guidance and protection of a 'Scheikh Hussein'.  Of the latter, Castlereagh had written: 'The Scheikh has been sitting for his picture, much against his will, as it is forbidden by the Koran, and this has evidently weighed heavily on Hussein's mind so that it is only by the gift of a pair of pistols, that he has been prevailed upon to allow himself to be immortalized by Lewis' (1:259-60, 283ff).

Each member of Castlereagh's entourage is situated in the shade of a delicately colored tent, the protection of which the Sheikh, as earlier noted, resolutely declines.  The tent's ceiling is decorated with elaborate gold arabesques and a pair of simple hanging pottery jugs. A wooden supporting pole provides a resting place for at least one sword and several other finely carved pieces of Arab weaponry. Below, amidst the ewers, brass bowls, pipes, and Bedouin draperies that litter the tent floor (a domestic foil to the pole's more hostile display), there are distinctly European objects as well. The paraphernalia includes the afore-mentioned folded paper map, various travel documents, two copies of Galignani's Messenger (an English-language newspaper, published in Paris and sold throughout Europe and the Middle East in the nineteenth century), a magazine, on the cover of which the word 'Review' is just legible, a bottle labeled 'Harvey's' (probably an anchovy-based sauce for meats and fowl), a billows for the fire, and a second, conspicuously Western-breed, dog.  Each of these is bathed in brilliant sunlight and is rendered by Lewis in the fastidious manner for which he had become known.

Littering the foreground of the picture is a row of dead animals and birds. To the left, the broken, yet still somehow graceful, body of a gazelle lies atop a miniature kilim, or flat-weave rug.  Beside it are two hares.  To the right, several game birds remind us of Castlereagh's good shot, and the talent of his black and white hunting dog.  Between these two groups, and dividing the composition exactly in half, is the distant monastery of Saint Catherine (fig. 2).  This structure, dating from the sixth century, was originally dedicated to the Virgin Mary, but was renamed two centuries later, after bones identified as belonging to the Saint were found there. Before these Christian associations had been realized, however, the site had housed a thriving mosque.  In order to ensure that both religions could function harmoniously on this mutually significant site, it was believed that the Prophet Mohammed had granted the members of the monastery a letter of protection against molestation by the long-established Muslim population.  Almost incredibly, given the volatile political history of the region, mosque and monastery continue to function without incident today.

By the nineteenth century, this extraordinary location had become a fashionable destination for European artists and writers, and a favorite topic in both literature and paint.¹²  Lewis's depiction of the monastery, however, stands apart from those of his colleagues. Rather than focusing on the architecture of St. Catherine's, Lewis turns his attention to the evocations of the site: as a bridge between Sheikh Hussein and Lord Castlereagh, centrally placed in the composition, the faint outline of the monastery becomes an affecting symbol of religious and cultural harmony – and thus a reflection of Lewis's own Anglo-Egyptian life.

This catalogue note was written by Dr. Emily M. Weeks.   Dr. Weeks is the author of Cultures Crossed: John Frederick Lewis (1804-1876) and the Art of Orientalist Painting (forthcoming, Yale University Press), in which this painting figures prominently.

¹ Private Collection, Surrey, England.  Though not as famous as his grandfather Robert Stewart, first Marquess of Londonderry, Frederick William Robert Stewart was a prominent figure in English political, social, and literary circles.  In 1862, however, Castlereagh began to experience the mental troubles that would ultimately remove him from public life.  George E. Cokayne, et. al., eds., The Complete Peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain and the United Kingdom: extant, extinct, or dormant (London: St. Catherine's Press, Ltd., 1910-59), 8:115.

² John Ruskin, Review of A Frank Encampment in the Desert of Mount Sinai, 1842 . . ., Academy Notes (1856); quoted in The Works of John Ruskin, E. T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn, eds. (London: George Allen; New York: Longmans, Green, & Co., 1903-12), 14:73-8.

³ Indeed, nearly every major composition executed by Lewis after 1863 was reproduced in both oils and watercolors.  A thorough discussion of this practice is provided by Weeks, in chapters 6 and 7 of Cultures Crossed.

⁴ Letter from John Ruskin to John Frederick Lewis, 1856, Private Collection, Surrey.   

⁵ Thackeray visited the artist in Cairo in October 1846, and wrote of the experience at great length.  See M. A. Titmarsh (William Makepeace Thackeray), Notes of a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo (Chapman & Hall, 1846), pp. 282-91.  For a discussion of the truth and fiction within this account, see Weeks, Cultures Crossed, chapters 1 and 2; and Emily M. Weeks, 'John Frederick Lewis (1805-1876): Mythology as Biography, or Dis-Orienting the "Languid Lotus-Eater",' in Travellers in the Levant: Voyagers and Visionaries, Sarah Searight and Malcolm Wagstaff , eds. (Durham, UK: Association for the Study of Travel in Egypt and the Near East, 2001), pp. 177-96.

⁶ Lewis visited the Sinai and the monastery of St. Catherine's, the setting of this particular painting, on at least one occasion, in 1842.  For more on Lewis's many excursions in Egypt and his interest in archaeology and the preservation of Egypt's cultural heritage, see Weeks, Cultures Crossed, chapter 2.

⁷ The (often deliberate) similarities between Lewis and many of the bearded figures in his compositions is discussed at length in Weeks, Cultures Crossed.  See also Emily M. Weeks,  'Cultures Crossed: John Frederick Lewis and the Art of Orientalist Painting,' in The Lure of the East: British Orientalist Painting, 1830-1925, Exh. Cat., ed. Nicholas Tromans (London: Tate Britain Publications, 2008), pp. 22-3.

⁸ Though not identical, this picture is one of several in a series of desert scenes painted by the artist after 1851. 

⁹ A thorough identification and explanation of each of the details within A Frank Encampment, including the semi-autobiographical and curiously unflattering figure of Lord Castlereagh, is contained in Weeks, Cultures Crossed, chapter 7.

¹⁰  Lewis's inclusion of the little dog was not completely allegorical: During their travels through North Africa and the Middle East, Castlereagh's entourage had carved their names into the exterior of the Great Temple of Ramses II at Abu Simbel; the last name on the list was 'Dusty', their sand-colored dog.  Searight, p. 1259. 

Antonio Schranz began his career as a topographical artist, being hired by wealthy British travelers in Greece, Asia Minor, and Egypt, before turning to photography in 1847.

¹¹ See Frederick William Robert Stewart [Lord Castlereagh], A Journey to Damascus through Egypt, Nubia, Arabia Petraea, Palestine and Syria (London, 1847), 2 vols.  For a considered discussion of the Egyptian travels of Castlereagh see, Briony Llewellyn and John Ruffle, '"I shall go on till I drop": The Travels of Viscount Castlereagh in Egypt and the Levant, 1841-42,' forthcoming.

¹² William Henry Bartlett (1809-1854), the French painter Adrien Dauzats (1804-1868), and Lewis's good friend David Roberts, each executed pictures of Saint Catherine's in the late 1830s and 1840s, and Richard Beavis (1824-1896) continued the tradition well into the 1870s. A vivid description of what the arduous but popular journey to the site was like at this time is provided by Sir John Gardner Wilkinson, in his Handbook for Travellers to Egypt  (London, 1847), pp. 213-20. Wilkinson mentions Sheikh Hussein by name, and recommends to travelers that they secure his protection when crossing this barren and still hostile terrain.