Dominic Serres
Dominic Serres (born between 1719 and 1722 in Auch ; died November 4, 1793 ), also called Dominick Serres or Dominic Serres the Elder, was a British marine painter from France and one of the founders of the Royal Academy of Arts . As a representative of the English School , he is considered to be one of the most important marine painters in the United Kingdom of the late 18th century.
Life
Serres' year of birth is controversial. The alleged year of birth 1722 contradicts a diary entry of the British landscape painter Joseph Farington , who gives Serres' age on the day of his death as 73 or 74 years. Family records of Serres' descendants also suggest an earlier birthday.
At the request of his parents, he was supposed to pursue a priestly career, but he broke off the training to become a priest at the Benedictine school in Douai and went to Spain. Since later companions reported that Serres had an excellent command of the Italian language , it is assumed that he was employed in merchant shipping on the Mediterranean in the following years . This, and the fact that he later often chose depictions of Italian ports as a motif for his pictures, also indicates that he lived in Italy for some time. At an unknown point in time, Serres embarked for South America and lived for a few years as a merchant and merchant in Havana .
In the Caribbean he was captured by British forces in 1748 as the helmsman of his own merchant ship and brought to London . Here Serres was imprisoned in Marshalsea , a guilty prison that was located in Southwark .
After his release from captivity, he lived in Northamptonshire for some time , where he began to make a living painting nautical motifs. He first copied works by the Dutch marine painters Willem van de Velde the Elder and Willem van de Velde the Younger, who were very popular in England at the time . He later went back to London , where he met the marine painter Charles Brooking , who taught him and gave him the technical basics of painting. At first the family lived near London Bridge , where Serres sold his paintings to the nautical residents of the Pool of London . The couple moved to Piccadilly around 1760 .
With the outbreak of the Seven Years' War , in which the British naval forces were involved in numerous skirmishes on the world's seas, the population's interest in nautical motifs increased. In particular the year 1759, in which British troops emerged victorious from the naval battle in the Bay of Quiberon , the naval battle of Lagos and other disputes, inspired many English as "Annus mirabilis" ("Year of Miracles") to identify with the Navy and to Acquisition of corresponding pictures. With his seascapes, Serres met the taste of British society and achieved a high reputation. From the 1760s he exhibited works in the Incorporated Society of Artists , of which he became a member in 1765. George III engaged him in 1780 as a marine painter.
In 1768 Serres was a founding member of the Royal Academy of Arts , of which he became librarian in 1793. Serres died a year later and was buried in the cemetery of St. Marylebone Church in Marylebone . His wife Mary and their children received grants from the Royal Academy in the years that followed.
family
Dominic Serres married 18-year-old Mary Colldycutt on July 16, 1749. They were married as part of a so-called "Fleet Wedding", a cheaper and less formal type of marriage that was possible without belonging to a particular community and was common in the area around the Fleet Prison at the time. The couple had four daughters, Catherine, Augusta Charlotte, Johanna and Sarah, and two sons, the older of whom, John Thomas Serres , also became a marine painter. Dominique Michael, the younger, also became a painter but specialized in depicting landscapes.
Liber Nauticus
A collection of Dominic Serre's graphics and the works of his son John Thomas Serres were published by him under the title Liber nauticus and instructor in the art of marine drawing in 1805 in London.
The Liber Nauticus contains 24 graphics that were created by engravers based on images from Dominic Serres. Based on these motifs, the second part of the book illustrated how various details of the rigging and hull, which are explained in the first part, can be combined to represent a ship. The peculiarity of Serres' pictures in Liber Nauticus is that not only one ship is depicted, but that there are always several others in the background. Accordingly, the publisher Edward Orme announced that "every type of ship currently sailing the seas" can be seen.
literature
- William Sandby: The history of the Royal Academy of Arts from its foundation in 1768 to the present time. With biographical notices of all the members. Volume I. Longman Green, Longman Roberts & Green, London 1862, pp. 104-105 ( Text Archive - Internet Archive ).
- Alan Russett: Dominic Serres War artist to the navy , Antique Collectors' Club, Woodbridge 2001, ISBN 1-85149-360-3
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Dominic Serres . In: General Artist Lexicon . The visual artists of all times and peoples (AKL). Volume 103, de Gruyter, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-11-023269-1 , p. 153.
- ^ Entry on Dominic Serres on the Royal Academy website accessed on February 5, 2019
- ^ FB Crockett: Early Sea Painters 1660-1730 The group who worked in England under the shadow of the Van de Veldes , Antique Collectors Club, Woodbridge 1995, ISBN 1-85149-230-5
- ↑ entry for Liber nauticus on the website of the Royal Collection Trust called on 5 February of 2019.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Serres, Dominic |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | English marine painter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | around 1722 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Also |
| DATE OF DEATH | November 4, 1793 |