Lot 71: William Bell Scott , 1811-1890 penkill castle, ayrshire watercolour

signed and dated with initials l.r.: W.B.S. 17/ 3/ 63 watercolour

measurements note 13 by 26.5 cm.; 5 ¼ by 10 ½ in.

J. S. Maas & Co., London, where purchased by Sir David Scott, 25 May 1965 for £36.15.0

William Bell Scott met Alice Boyd, whose house in Ayrshire the present drawing represents, in 1859. Although Scott was already married, from that time he and Alice were deeply attached to each other, spending the summers and Christmas together at Penkill and staying in London at Bellevue House, Cheyne Walk, on other occasions.

Much of Scott's later work was done at Penkill, including a series of murals painted in 1865-8 on the theme of the The King's Quair, a love poem supposedly written by King James I of Scotland. In addition, Alice Boyd and William Bell Scott invited other members of the Pre-Raphaelite circle to Penkill, including Dante Gabriel and William Michael Rossetti, as well as their sister Christina, and Arthur Hughes.

Scott's drawing shows the main tower of Penkill Castle, standing among trees, and with a winter sky. Further to the left is the spire of the Penkill parish church. The castle had first been constructed in about 1490, while the main tower was built in the sixteenth century by Adam Boyd. In the mid nineteenth century restoration and reconstruction of its fabric had been undertaken by Spencer Boyd.

The format of the present drawing, with the forms of the landscape restricted to a narrow band at the lower edge and all emphasis given to the sky as dusk comes on, was one for which Scott had a particular fondness. There are similar drawings of the sky at Tynemouth, as well as of the lantern of St Nicholas's Cathedral in Newcastle, all done when he was still living in the north east and serving as master of the School of Design in the city. Scott seems to have been especially interested in the transient effects of light in the northern landscape, descriptions which have their analogy in verse passages such as the following from his poem Rosabell:

The chill of eve is stayed from closing yet -
By the roseate golden streaks
Pressing back the impending dusk;
Day, like an eye that ought to watch,
Closes but by slow degrees ...