Gurnards

Maker Myles Birket Foster (British, 1825-1899)

ClassificationsDRAWINGS

Date1874

Mediumwatercolor and opaque watercolor over traces of graphite on wove paper

Dimensionsimage: 3 7/8 × 7 1/2 in. (9.8 × 19.1 cm.) sheet: 4 7/8 × 8 3/8 in. (12.4 × 21.3 cm.)

SignedSignature; with monogram: BF

InscribedInscribed: Gurnard, Brighton / 1874

Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. Gilbert Davis Collection

Status

Not on view

Label TextThis watercolor of a pair of gurnard, a bright red fish common to the eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean, was made at Brighton, a seaside resort where Birket Foster typically spent part of the winter. While the artist is best known for nostalgic and sentimental rural scenes, this image is much more straightforward. The careful study of the fishes’ anatomy and precise rendering of details such as their scales, made with hatched and stippled strokes of pigment, reflect a close observation of the natural world (2022).

Object number59.55.519

Terms