Mortimer Menpes collection of reproductions of the Great Masters [picture] / Mortimer Menpes
- Bib ID:
- 3044178
- Format:
- Picture
- Author:
- Menpes, Mortimer, 1855-1938
- Online Version:
- National Library of Australia digitised item. PIC Screen 119, 123, 161, 162 #S4516-S4553 copy
- Description:
-
- [between 1900 and 1909]
- 38 paintings : shellac on oil on cardboard ; 76.2 x 53.5 cm. and smaller.
- Summary:
-
Menpes made copies of paintings by the Old Masters in the early 1900s, travelling in France, Holland, Russia, and Britain to view originals. The copies included representative works of Rembrandt, Gainsborough, Rubens, Turner, Bellini, Van Dyck, Hals, da Vinci, Reynolds, Romney, Velazquez, ter Borch and Lawrence. These copies formed the bases for his series of prints published in 1905 and 1909. In 1911 Menpes presented the copies to Sir William Lyne who was in London representing the new Commonwealth of Australia at the coronation of George V. The collection was to form the nucleus of an intended National Gallery for the new Federal Capital of Australia. The Commonwealth Parliamentary Library was chosen as a repository in the interim. The collection is now held in the Pictorial Section, National Library of Australia.
- Biography/History:
-
Mortimer Luddington Menpes (1855-1938), painter, etcher and writer was born at Port Adelaide, S.A. He went to London in the 1870s where he studied art under Poynter at South Kensington and later with Whistler. Menpes travelled widely including Europe, Russia and Japan. He became a celebrated and much exhibited etcher. Menpes wrote a number of biographies including ones on Lord Kitchener, Whistler, Gainsborough and Rembrandt. He illustrated many books and established the Menpes Press for publishing colour reproductions of the Old Masters.
- Notes:
-
- Condition: Good. Paintings are oil (often thinned with a variety of media such as petroleum) on a white ground (probably gesso) painted on thick, and increasingly brittle, cardboard. A layer of shellac has been applied to each painting and treated to mimic the aged appearance of the originals.
- Images individually catalogued and digitised. Where known, location and description of original from which copy was made is noted.
- Title from "Catalogue of the Mortimer Menpes collection of reproductions of the Great Masters". See file 202/04/00114.
- PIC Screen 119, 123, 161, 162 #S4516-S4553 copy Also available online https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-146687853
- Rembrandt / Mortimer Menpes with an essay on the life and work of Rembrandt by C. Lewis Hind. London : Adam and Charles Black, 1905.
- Gainsborough / Mortimer Menpes text by James Greig. London : Adam and Charles Black, 1909.
- Subject:
- Art, European -- Copying
- Exhibited:
- Exhibited: Art Gallery of New South Wales travelling exhibitions program, regional N.S.W., 1945.
- Related Records:
-
This is a collection.
This collection contains 38 records. - Copyright:
-
Out of Copyright
If you wish to copy or order copies, contact us.
- Reason for copyright status:
- Creator Date of Death is Before 1955
Copyright status was determined using the following information:
- Material type:
- Artistic
- Presumed date of death of creator (latest date):
- 1938
- Published status:
- Unpublished
Copyright status may not be correct if data in the record is incomplete or inaccurate. Other access conditions may also apply. For more information please see: Copyright in library collections.
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