Londonners Gipsying

Charles Robert Leslie (1794 - 1859)

Geffrye, Museum of the Home

1820

This is an early and particularly attractive example of the work of this Anglo-American artist who specialised in humorous genre scenes, often taken from popular literary sources. It is an interesting social document of a party spending the day in the woods, then a very common thing among the middle classes in summer. The group of figures appears to be from the East End, with a cart, presumably hired for the occasion, to transport themselves and their belongings. Other interesting features are the blue and white tea service (possibly Spode) and the cane- and rush-bottomed chairs, of a type which inspired chair designs by William Morris and E. W. Godwin some forty years later.

• Medium: oil on canvas
• Dimensions: 81 x 99 cm
• Art Fund Grant: £2500 ( Total: £8,000)
• ArtFunded in: 1976
• Vendor: Agnew's

Provenance

Robert Donaldson; S.P.Avery; Agnew's; Col.W.J.Holdsworth;Sir Charles Tennant; by descent to Hon.Colin Tennant; Sotheby's; Agnew.

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