Gerrit Dou

After Gerrit Dou 7 April 1613 - 9 February 1675, also known as Gerard. Oil paintings on tin C: 1850.

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New England. Puritan.

Puritan C: 1900.

Late 19th century equine painting with Irish wolfhound

Terrible condition. Paint was powdery and flaking, the canvas torn, and the plaster frame had moulding missing, was covered in a tar grease with embedded soot and pet hair.

The paint's binder had collapsed and rubbing the image resulted in pigment stain crumbling away. The whole canvas was covered in tiny blisters where the paint was detaching from the support.
A challenge! How to clean it the painting without removing the image or permanently embedding  the grime.

The finished painting - without varnish.

Lautenschlager

Marie Lautenschlager 1859 - 1941 Germany.

To the reverse another painting. Shame i'm not able to split the canvas and have a 'bog off'.

Signature.

Completed.

Roybet

Ferdinand Victor Leon Roybet 1840 – 1920. Plaster frames damaged in sections and with gilt paint. Tears in several places with one large L shaped rip and over-cleaned losing detail and colour.

18th century naive portrait.

Small 18th century naive portrait. The original frame had lost all its moulding, but the unpainted area on the corners looked to me like oak leaves, so a walk to local oak tree and voila ... Back of canvas with board removed showing date marks - revealed now painting is on stretchers.

It's a painting of a composer holding a quill pen and lost in thought as he sits at his piano.

Stamp marks :

Canvas was taxed in the 18th century. As a consequence of legislation in 1784, a 'frame mark', associated with the duty payable on linen, was applied by the Excise to the back of canvases. It can provide useful information both as to the width and the length of the roll from which the canvas was cut. The mark took the form of a frame containing numbers and letters in compartments. Hence on Lemuel Abbott’s portrait of Viscount Bridport, 1785, the canvas width is given as 75 hundredths of a yard, i.e. 27 ins, the canvas length as 17 yards and the year indistinct, while on George Morland’s Inside of a Stable, exhibited in 1791 (Tate), the canvas width is given as 165 hundredths of a yard, i.e. 59.4 ins, the canvas length as 265 (apparently 26 ½ yards) and the year as 1790.

Detail from reverse of Lemuel Abbott’s Viscount Bridport, 1785 (National Portrait Gallery). 75, in the compartment at right, give the canvas roll width in hundredths of a yard, thus 27 ins (68.6 cm). To the left, 17 is the roll length in yards, thus 17 yards (15.55 metres). Further left, 2224 is a progressive control number. The illegible small numerals, turned sideways at extreme right, give the year duty was levied. At left, the mark is partly covered by the wooden stretcher. Above, the other way up, is the stamp of the canvas supplier, James Poole.

Further reading.

Huge gilt frame restoration

And the man who I had bought the frame from, introduced me to his client, who would like to own the pair of paintings, but I should match the gilt tone...





And here they are in situ. Working well with the contemporary apartment styling.

Mid-nineteenth century portrait

Cleaned and suitably framed. 

Charles Compton

Charles Compton 1828 - 1884. Horrible repair. Stuffed with black acrylic paint over a thick, rigid, canvas and without a frame.

I found the self-portrait as sold in 2011, which will make it easier to restore!

Work in progress ...

Charles Compton, self-portrait and finished.

Charles Compton self-portrait.

John Johnson Ather

Sometimes it isn’t only the painting that is engaging. It’s the research and/or the artist that is intriguing. I bought this painting on Ebay. Signature bottom right: John J Ather.

Not many references to this artist. Then after shifting the arrangement of the search string, this work popped up.

Lady Sylvia Maitland (1913–1991).

Thirlestane Castle. Thirlestane Castle Trust, which led me to the artist’s details: John Johnson Ather - 1915–1964.

I then switched to a BDM site and found his place of birth: 1915. Durham. Fortnately, Ather is a rare name... 

Then this appeared on the screen:
HMS Hood.
12 Aug 1915
Place of Birth: Brandon, Durham.
Former Occupation: Laboratory Assistant
Service: Royal Navy
Service No.: PSSX 16362
Previous Service No.: Not known
Rank in Hood (highest): Able Seaman (Pom pom Anti-aircraft Gunner)
Period in Hood: 21 Feb 1936 - 26 Sep 1937
Biographical Information: Served in/at H.M.S. Ramillies, Revenge, Victory and Excellent during the Second world war.

Here’s John Johnson Ather's photograph. And another photo of the good-looking chappie aboard HMS Hood.

John Johnson Ather

John Johnson Ather - top right

maitland tartan

Anyway, back to the painting, the sitter appears to wear maitland tartan, which suggests he's a relative of Lady Sylvia Maitland ... How he became an artist and earned that commission to paint Lady Maitland, I don't know - yet. But his painting still hangs in Thirlestane Castle - and another in my house.
Sadly, these are the only two paintings and references to him I can find.

Ather signatures compared

Under the brown, flaking background particles of blue remained, which I matched and this is the result. 

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The comments on this post are revealing, interesting, and more than generous in the time and effort to add to the information of the talented John Ather. I'll add the images from the comments to the main blog overtime, but first I'll post this image by John Ather of his daughter, Carolyn. 

The following paintings are in private ownership.

David Wilkie?

Before and finished. Not yet varnished.