Henry Edrington Hobson A Young Fern Gatherer

An original 1867 watercolour painting, Henry Edrington Hobson, A Young Fern Gatherer.

A particularly fine portrait in watercolour by Henry Edrington Hobson (1820–1881). The charming pastoral subject shows a beautiful peasant girl working the land. It is an idealised vision—her cheeks rosy and her hair adorned with flowers—one which have appealed to Victorian tastes for the sentimental and picturesque.

Henry Edrington Hobson (1820–1881) was the son of the artist Henry Hobson of Bath, who was a topographical etcher, active around 1819 to 1846. He exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1857 and 1866. He married the portrait watercolourist Ada Vinson Hardy (1829–1911), with whom he had five children. Their children also became artists, one of whom, Mabel (1867–1943), painted miniatures and married the illustrator William Lee Hankey (1869–1952).

The painting is inscribed on the verso: 'J.W. Gibbs Gift with kindest regards from H.E. Hobson. June 1867'.

In watercolour heightened in white. On watercolour board. Painted in an oval vignette. The watercolour requires an oval mount.