Study of Roses, “La France” by Robert Bateman (1842–1922). 1881. Oil on canvas, 12¾ x 10¼ inches (32.3 x 26 cm). Private collection.
Bateman showed this work at the Grosvenor Gallery Winter Exhibition of 1881/82, no. 296. He exhibited a number of studies of roses over the years including his York and Lancaster Roses at the Grosvenor Gallery in 1887, no. 71, and Roses at the Royal Academy in 1889, no. 47. His friend Walter Crane noted: “Bateman was the most remarkable draughtsman of flowers among moderns I have seen, after the best Japanese work” (98).
Bateman had inherited his interest in botany from his father James Bateman, the great Victorian horticulturalist. James Bateman was renowned for creating one of the most innovative gardens of its time at his home at Biddulph Grange in Staffordshire. He was also well known for his book Orchidiaceae of Mexico and Guetemale of 1837-43. Robert Bateman, of course, was also a gardener and garden designer. He is known not only for the changes he made to the gardens at Biddulph Old Hall but especially the garden he redesigned at his home Benthall Hall, a sixteenthth-century mansion near Much Wenlock in Shropshire. At one time Bateman had also planned to publish a book on plants illustrated with engravings by him on copper, but unfortunately this project never came to fruition.
Bibliography
Crane, Walter. An Artist’s Reminiscences. London: Methuen, 1907.
Hartnoll, Julian. A Selection of Drawings and Oil Paintings Offered for sale by Julian Hartnoll. London: (1991): cat. 10.
Last modified 17 February 2023