Arthur John Elsley

Stacy Marks, Eastbourne;
Private collection

Liverpool, Walker Art Gallery, Autumn Exhibition, 1908, no.1043

Terry Parker, Golden Hours, The Paintings of Arthur J. Elsley 1860-1952, 1998, illus. p.111

STRUCTURE This picture is unlined and in very good condition. The paint surface is a little dirty and may benefit from a light clean. There are localised areas of craquelure; particularly above the puppy's head, to the right of the girl's arm. UNDER ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT There are retouchings around the man's head and to his collar, to the trees in the top left corner, to the star design on the balustrade, to the puppy's paw, chin and back, around the girl's head, to the path and possibly in the sky. These retouchings have been very well executed. FRAME The picture is contained in a moulded plaster and gilt frame (in very good condition).
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Arthur John Elsley was born at Derby Street in London's Mayfair and his father was a coachman and an amateur artist, therefore the young boy was brought up appreciating art and with a genuine affection for animals. His father was sufficiently talented to have a painting A Group of Horses, exhibited at the British Institution in 1845. John Elsley was forced to give up his work as a coachman following an illness in the early 1870s and worked as a resident caretaker at a firm of stockbrokers close to the Bank of England. It was around this time that his son painted his earliest known picture, of a cairn terrier named Vic which shows an influence from the work of Edwin Landseer, the foremost animal painter of the nineteenth century. The artist was only eleven years old when Vic was painted but his father encouraged his efforts and allowed him to follow the precarious path of becoming an artist. By 1874 the young Elsley had recognised the value of sketching animals from life at the Zoological Gardens as many artists had done before him. He filled his sketchbooks with drawings of the exotic animals in the collection and also made sketches of farm animals. It was thus that he produced a folio of work for submission to the entrance committee of the South Kensington School of Art when he was fourteen. His career was almost brought to a halt at this time when he contracted measles which almost blinded him; his eyesight was permanently damaged. In the winter of 1876 Elsley was made a probationer at the Royal Academy Schools and was taught by tutors that included Frederick Pickersgill, Edward Armitage, Henry Bowler and John Marshall, presided over by Sir Francis Grant. In his first year at the schools Elsley painted a faithful copy of John Frederick Herring's Three Horses Watering which at that time hung at the National Gallery. His interest in horses was probably due to his father's earlier career and Elsley's first Royal Academy exhibit was another equestrian subject Portrait of an Old Pony of 1878. His proud father lived long enough to see this painting exhibited but died less than a month later leaving Elsley, the eldest son, head of the household.

Following his graduation in 1881 or 1882 Elsley found work painting portraits of dogs, children and horses and fortunately attracted the patronage of the Benett-Stanford family who lived near Brighton. Elsley had painted Mr Benett-Stanford's dog Jim in 1880 when he was still a student and in 1885 he painted Ellen Benett-Stanford on her Horse Congress and her husband Vere Benett-Stanford which was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1886. In April 1885 Elsley's first published work was printed in Young England, a magazine for boys. The picture was a line engraving of two horses being led away from a storm entitled April Floods in the Eastern Counties. This heralded the start of commercial success for the sale of copyright of his exhibited paintings for illustrations in books and advertisements. In 1887 Elsley was living in Kensington sharing a studio with the portrait painter George Greville Manton. It was Manton that introduced Elsley to Fred Morgan and in 1889 when Manton quit the studio, Elsley and Morgan took a studio together in St. John's Wood; Elsley continued to live at Angel Court in the City with his mother and siblings. Morgan's first marriage to the artist Alice Havers had broken down and they divorced but the time working with Elsley helped to strengthen both of their careers. Morgan found difficulty painting animals and therefore he and Elsley collaborated on pictures at that time, Morgan painting the figures and Elsley painting the dogs or horses.

At the Crystal Palace Exhibition of 1891 the large canvas The Baliff's [sic] Daughter of Islington won a silver medal for Elsley and a year later the publication of a print of I'se Biggest (Sotheby's, New York, 2 November 1999, lot 74) which was so popular that it had to be re-engraved. I'se Biggest demonstrates Elsley's ability to depict the innocence of childhood alongside their playful and loyal pets, with sentiment and not by resorting to an overt anthropomorphic portrayal of animals. The success of this painting and the publication of Grandfather's Pet in The Illustrated London News Christmas edition in the same year, made Elsley financially stable enough to marry Emily (Emm) Fusedale, his second cousin, in November 1893. Following the death of Charles Burton Barber in 1894, Elsley became the foremost painter of animals and children and over the next two decades he painted many pictures that were highly popular when exhibited and even more popular when printed. Around 1900 Fred Morgan accused Elsley of using one of his ideas for a painting and unfortunately their friendship never recovered. Following their argument, Elsley began to paint pictures on a grander scale, often with many figures and animals. In 1903 Arthur and Emm's only child Marjorie was born and her father used her often as the model for his paintings. Fortunately she bore an 'uncanny resemblance to a model he had used a few years earlier who might have been the child of one of his siblings or, perhaps, one of Emm's sisters' (Terry Parker, Golden Hours: The Paintings of Arthur J. Elsley 1860-1952, 1998, p. 11).

Pick of the Litter is an Edwardian country idyll of an old huntsman introducing a beagle puppy to two delighted young children on the riverside terrace of a grand house. The younger of the children, modeled Marjorie, is dressed for tea, whilst her brother has been playing tennis. As the little girl takes the paw of the puppy in her hand the mother hound looks on protectively. It is known that Elsley took a photograph in his studio of the models dressed in the their costumes, which he used for this painting and the model for the huntsman appears to have been a Mr G.F. Riches in a costume hired from a costumiers at 13 Upper Philmore Place in Kensington. Elsley always captured the delight and exuberance of children, often comparing the innocence of childhood with the fragility of young animals, such as the another picture of Marjorie teaching a puppy to drink tea, Too Hot (sold in these rooms, 15 November 2011, lot 43) and An Uninvited Guest (Sotheby's, New York, 20 April 2005, lot 99) in which four puppies are disturbed by the presence of a toad to the amusement of two sisters. Pick of the Litter was used in July 1908 as an advertisement for Bovril.