William Henry Harriott Claudian Landscape with Dancing Figures

An original early 19th-century watercolour painting, William Henry Harriott, Claudian Landscape with Dancing Figures.

This beautifully fine watercolour showing a classical Claudian landscape is by William Henry Harriott (c.1790–1839), who was a good friend of leading watercolourist John Sell Cotman (1782–1842). Harriott, a clerk in the War Office, would spend several months each year on the Continent where he would industriously produce a large number of sketches and drawings. Harriott's Continental drawings were often elaborately detailed, owing much to the topographical work of Samuel Prout—from whom Harriott received instruction at Dr William Glennie’s academy in Dulwich Grove.

Cotman admired these so much that Harriott allowed him to make tracings of them for his own use; Cotman writes: 'Mr. Harriott’s sketches of many parts of the Continent are before me – with the entire power, and perhaps permission, to make my own. They are very fine and ought not to be lost to the world.' With Cotman, Harriott moved in illustrious artistic circles, Cotman declaring 'Last night I had a party of twelve – the two Lewis’s, Cattermole, Harding, Cox, Harriott, Bulwer, Maw – the last, amateur – Starke, Cooke, Son(?) – What a sphere to move in! Such exalted talent!' (The Cotman Letters, Leeds Art Gallery).

The present watercolour is not Harriott's usual topographical subject but rather a capriccio Italianate landscape in the style of Claude Lorrain. A musician plays and figures dance in a vision of rustic festivity before a landscape backdrop of supreme balance and proportion. Classical ruins, a winding river and handsome trees complete the perfect picturesque composition. Claude painted a number of similar subjects with dancing figures, such as 'Landscape with Country Dance' (1640-1, Woburn Abbey) and Landscape with the Marriage of Isaac and Rebekah ('The Mill') (1648, National Gallery, London). It is likely that Harriott encountered and was inspired by Claude's work on the Continent.

Little is documented about Harriott's life or family, but it appears that his mother was the talented 18th-century miniaturist Diana Hill (c.1760–1844), whose second marriage was to Major Thomas Harriott. Hill travelled to India with her husband, where William was born around 1790, and where Diana became one of the most prominent miniaturists in India. The family returned to England in 1806 and took up residence at West Hall in Kew. William Henry Harriott died relatively young but Diana Hill lived into old age.

This watercolour has not come to the open market individually before, having been kept inside a 19th-century album.

Provenance: From an album belonging to Edward Garstin (1794–1871), superintendent at Bengal, given to his daughter Louisa Charlotte Garstin in 1855. It seems probable that the Garstins knew the young Harriott in India.

In watercolour with gum arabic to intensify the colour. On card. Tipped on to backing paper with inscription below.