Name: Attrib. William 'Quaker' Pegg, Anemone Flowers – mid-19th-century watercolour
Brand: Somerset & Wood
SKU: JZ-307
Price: 310.00 GBP
Availability: OutOfStock

Attrib. William 'Quaker' Pegg, Anemone Flowers – mid-19th-century watercolour

An original mid-19th-century watercolour painting, Attrib. William 'Quaker' Pegg, Anemone Flowers.

A rare flower subject attributed to the celebrated Derby ceramics artist William 'Quaker' Pegg (1775–1851). Pegg is regarded by many as being the finest flower painter to have ever worked in ceramics. He also has an interesting biography in which his passion for his art was in tumultuous conflict with his ardent Quaker beliefs.

This watercolour is one of a small collection of eight flower subjects, two of which are signed 'Wm Pegg'. The watercolours in this collection bear Pegg's distinctive flamboyant yet natural style, in which the leaves are markedly shadowed and appear to fold and curl.

Pegg is known to have produced sketches in watercolour and pencil as preliminary studies for his finished designs. A sketchbook of his work is held in the collection of the Royal Crown Derby Museum. Our watercolours are variously inscribed 1829, 1830 and 1841, dating them to the later period of the artist's life. Pegg's conflict between his art and his Quaker faith led him to burn most of his personal sketchbooks from his earlier period, which is why extant drawings date from after his return to the Derby factory in 1813. In later life, Pegg became a shopkeeper, having a hucksters shop at 38 Nottingham Road, Derby, close to the old factory site. Although Pegg no longer worked as an artist at this time, he reportedly hung watercolours in the window of his shop.

In watercolour with graphite on wove paper.

Flowers of William 'Quaker' Pegg (1775–1851)

William 'Quaker' Pegg (1775–1851) was born at Whitmore, near Newcastle-under-Lyme, the son of a gardener. His family moved to Shelton in the Potteries two years later. Aged just ten he was put to work in an earthenware factory, becoming an apprentice painter aged fourteen.In the autumn of 1796, having completed his apprenticeship he moved to Derby to begin his employment at the Nottingham Road factory. Pegg spent five years at Derby working as one of the company’s top porcelain painters before leaving due to religious reasons. Having moved towards the Quaker faith, he found his new beliefs in conflict with his passion, the frivolous art of painting, and he radically changed his life, quitting the factory and for the next twelve years earning a meagre living as a stockingmaker.In 1813, however, he returned to Derby to resume his career as a china painter. This was to be the start of his finest period, when he produced the flower painting many consider to be the greatest of all time. His work displayed a freedom of expression that was to increase over the coming years and which is often described as flamboyant.By 1820 Pegg had another change of heart and left the factory for good, taking up as a shopkeeper with his wife at 38 Nottingham Road, Derby, close to the factory site, where he worked for the remainder of his life.Pegg's work is highly collectable with examples in the Victoria and Albert Museum and Royal Crown Derby Museum.