Allen Culpepper Sealy Cutter Boat, Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, Wales

An original 1883 oil painting, Allen Culpepper Sealy, Cutter Boat, Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, Wales.

This handsome oil painting has a lovely breezy feel, focusing on a small cutter sailing boat traversing calm estuary waters. The location appears to be in the Milford Haven waterway in Pembrokeshire, Wales, with the distinctive Stack Rock Fort in the background. Despite the flourishing commercial and military activities in British coastal waters in the late Victorian period, the atmosphere here is more one of recreation than of industry or naval activity.

Allen Culpepper Sealy (1850–1927) was born at Bitton, Keynsham, Somerset, the son of a landowner. He studied at Bristol School of Art and by 1881 he was a professional artist living in Marylebone, London. He became known as an equestrian painter and he travelled extensively on commissions around the UK. His painting ‘Kingwood’ is in the National Horseracing Museum at Newmarket.

Sealy's skill for rendering animals prompted numerous collaborations with other artists throughout his career, where Sealy would paint the animals in a scene. His open style of brushwork, reminiscent of the work of John Emms, and thick heavy palette would give the feeling of texture and density to the animal's coat. In the present painting the artist uses this technique to render the texture of the water, contrasting with the smoother finish to the sails and sky.

Sealy exhibited extensively, including at the Royal Academy (1875–1886), Birmingham Royal Society of Artists, the Fine Art Society, Walker Art Gallery, Manchester City Art Gallery, Royal Society of British Artists, Royal Hibernian Academy and the Royal Institute of Oil Painters.

Oil on canvas on stretchers. Unframed.