On the East Lyn, North Devon. William Henry Millais, 1828-1899. Watercolour heightened with bodycolour and gum arabic; signed and inscribed 'Lyn. N.D' 19 x 28 inches. Now in the collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington: collection, accession no. 2017.37.1. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
Commentary by the Maas Gallery
The River Lyn in North Devon consists of two channels, the East and West Lyn, that rise on Exmoor and join at Lynmouth. The East Lyn drops through a steep rocky valley or "cleave" above Lynmouth in an area known as "Little Switzerland" to the Romantic poets, a dramatic landscape then remote and inaccessible, hidden in ancient oak woodland. It was a favourite haunt of Millais, whose brother John Everett tried to "bully him into doing nothing all summer but paint in the fields" (a comment by Rossetti in 1849). He was overshadowed by his brother all his life, but he was the first of the Pre-Raphaelite set to apply their principles to landscape. From about 1860, he mostly painted river landscapes in watercolour, and two other highly finished watercolours of the Lyn are dated 1865.
Additional Commentary by Dennis T. Lanigan
This area of North Devon was obviously popular with Millais. The Valley of Rocks, Lynton, North Devon was painted on a trip there in 1857. The National Gallery of Art, Washington, which now has the work in its collection, has dated On the East Lyn, North Devon to c.1865. This is certainly possible since a watercolour entitled Woodland scene, Lynmouth dated 1865 sold at Rosebery's, London, on 6 December 2017 (lot 575).
The village of Lynmouth is located on the North Devon coast on the northern edge of Exmoor at the junction of the East Lyn and West Lyn Rivers. It is in a gorge about 200 meters below its neighbouring village of Lynton. The area has always been popular with artists, who admire its high sea cliffs, deep river gorges, and generally pristine landscape. The most famous of the gorges is the Glen Lyn Gorge. The East Lyn River is formed by the joining of two minor tributaries at Malmstead, flows towards Watersmeet where it joins with Hoar Oak Water, then passes through a narrow gorge section before finally flowing down to Lynford where it joins with the West Lyn River prior to running into the Bristol Channel. The valley is described poetically by John Presland: "As you ascend the river the gorge becomes narrow and more thickly wooded; the path winding along it is hot and close and still; the water is clear brown in its depths, and green in the shallows and where it slides over a mossy stone; it bubbles into foam in its tiny waterfalls and cataracts and miniature whirlpools; it is deliciously sweet and cool" (87-88).
Millais' watercolour features the turbulent East Lyn River flowing through a gorge and surrounded by huge boulders painted with Pre-Raphaelite exactitude. Vegetation, including large trees, fills the river valley and two deer are visible in the midground. In the background rugged rocky cliffs under a cloudy sky surround the river valley.
Bibliography
Presland, John. Lynton and Lynmouth: A Pageant of Cliff & Moorland. Illustrated by F. J. Widgery. London: Chatto & Windus, 1919. Internet Archive, from a copy in Robarts Library, University of Toronto. Web. 12 November 2024.
Victorian Pictures. London: Sotheby's (November 10, 1999): lot 153, 90-91
"William Henry Millais: On the East Lyn, North Devon, c. 1865." National Gallery of Art, Washington. Web. 12 November 2024.
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Created 5 September 2014
Last modified 12 November 2024.