Shipping in a Storm
Attributed to NICHOLAS POCOCK (1740-1821)
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Dimensions 8.25inch wide 6.25inch high (20.95 cm wide 15.87 cm high) |
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Description Shipping in a Storm NICHOLAS POCOCK |
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Stock no.
X5676
Period
1740
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Literature X5676B SHIPPING IN A STORM ATTRIBUTED TO NICHOLAS POCOCK 1740 – 1821 Oil on canvas 6 ¼ x 8 ¼ inches Nicholas Pocock was born in Bristol and was the son of a Bristol merchant, who had married a cousin of the Duke of Roxburgh. Pocock went to sea in 1766 and was in command of the Lloyd, a merchantman belonging to Richard Champion who was the maker of Bristol porcelain. He also made twelve voyages mostly to America commanding two more of Champion’s ships the Betsey & Minerva. Pocock was already an amateur painter and every day when writing the ships log he would include a little wash drawing of the ship showing the state of the weather or any thing significant that had happened during the day. Seven of the logbooks have survived and four are in the National Maritime Museum Greenwich, one in the City of Bristol Records office and one in Mariners Museum Newport news and the seventh is untraced. Pocock’s earliest surviving watercolour is a rather primitive painting of the Ruby of Bristol dated 1759. In 1780 he married and this additional stimulus to leave the sea and settle down seems to have been artistically decisive. In the same year he sent a picture to the Royal Academy, though it arrived too late to be in the exhibition he received an encouraging letter of advice from the President, Sir Joshua Reynolds. In 1782 two views near Bristol and two marine paintings were accepted and he exhibited there every year until 1812 and finally in 1815. In 1789 he moved to London where like the marine painter Domonic Serres before him, his immense practical knowledge of ships and the sea and a good address immediately recommended him to naval clients to record their actions at sea. Pocock was obviously going to be Serres successor though not without competition from artists such as Dodd, Luny and Whitcombe. In 1794 he went to sea with the fleet to witness the Battle of the Glorious First of June and was busily employed recording the many actions of the long French wars. In 1817 two years after he exhibited at the Royal Academy he suffered a stroke, which prevented him doing any further work. He died in Maidenhead on March 19th 1821. The National Maritime Museum held a Pocock exhibition in 1975 of his watercolours with a reference catalogue. The Bristol City Art Gallery published an illustrated catalogue, ‘Marine Artists of Bristol’ to accompany their joint exhibition on Pocock & Joseph Walter in 1982. Works in Museums: Ulster Museum Belfast, City Art Gallery Bristol, National Maritime Museum Greenwich, Shipley Art Gallery Gateshead, and Royal Navel Museum Portsmouth. Bibl: Dictionary of Sea Painters – E.H.H. Archibald |
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