Richard Redgrave RA (1804 - 1888)
RA Collection: Art
A sketch for 'The Reduced Gentleman's Daughter'. Redgrave painted this scene illustrating a passage from The Rambler and exhibited it at the Royal Academy in 1840 (untraced). He later produced a print of the scene engraved by Richard Hatfield and published on 10 April 1842.
This sketch shows the daughter on the right wearing black as she is in the etching. There is a similar colour sketch for the composition at the Yale Center for British Art, B1987.7 http:// collections.britishart.yale.edu/vufind/Record/3643329.
A set of preparatory drawings for 'The Reduced Gentleman's Daughter' in an album of Redgrave's works (16/1281). These include small compositional sketches in pen and ink and a more detailed colour study.
The scene is one that Redgrave painted and exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1840 though the original painting is now untraced. The composition was also engraved by Richard Hatfield (example in the V&A) and published in 1842.
The subject is derived from an episode in Samuel Johnson's The Rambler in which 'a poor lady seeks for a situation, and is cruelly received by her would-be employer'.
122 mm x 150 mm