Thursday, October 22, 2009

a songbird and a spider dance

I found this lovely little watercolour [with the frame] at a mad jumble of a brocante in an unremarkable suburb of Paris... I love the fresh spring colours, the spontaneous brush-strokes and the naive quality of it...[the slight white line just right of center in this image is from a reflection in the glass and is not on the painting]

Unsigned and undated [my guess is pre-1960's, judging from the frame];
watercolour on paper;
12 x 16 cm / 17.5 x 22 cm framed in gold-painted wood

CAD/US$200/Euros140

*****


"THE TARANTELLA DANCE"
"Printed in Oil Colours
By G. Baxter
The Inventor and Patentee
XI. Northampton Square"
is stamped on the lower left hand corner of the backing paper;
found [with frame] at the brocante fair at Chatou outside of Paris;
10 x 7.5 cm / 17 x 13 cm framed in gold-painted wood

CAD/US$200/Euros140


G. BAXTER is presumably George Baxter [1804-1867] and there is a website about his life and work, with a complete listing of his oil colour prints. There is mention of the Tarantella Set [1850], of which this print must be a part of, but there is no accompanying image to confirm its belonging.
[The Tarantella dance is a rapid whirling folk dance that originated in southern Italy from a dancing mania, also known as tarantism, supposedly caused by the bite of a tarantula spider!]

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