William Alfred Delamotte

Waterperry, Oxfordshire

1803

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Not on display

Artist: William Alfred Delamotte 1775–1863
Medium: Oil paint on board
Dimensions: Support: 324 × 489 mm
frame: 413 × 578 × 45 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Purchased 1968
Reference: T01050

Display caption

This is one of a number of oil sketches Delamotte made from nature during
his tenure as drawing master at the
Royal Military Academy at Great Marlow. Despite being a sketch, it is very
carefully painted.

An inscription on the back gives details
of the weather for the two days he spent on the work: on the first it was thundery, by the second it was clearing but
cloudy. Constable was later to make
often extensive meteorological notes
on the backs of his own oil sketches, especially the sky studies he painted
at Hampstead.

Gallery label, September 2004

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Catalogue entry

William Delamotte 1775–1863

T01050 WATERPERRY, OXFORDSHIRE 1803
Inscribed on the back: ‘July 1^st: Waterperry. Oxon. 1803 W^m: DelaMotte 1^st. day. cloudy, & likely to rain w. Thundor storms —2^d Day. Weather clearing. w. cloud’.

Oil on board, 12 3/4×19 1/4 (32·5×49).

Purchased from Thos. Agnew & Sons Ltd (Florence Fox Bequest) 1968.

Coll: ...; W E Coe & Sons, sold 1967 to P D Jolly, sold Sotheby's, 21 December 1967 (193), bt. Agnew.

Delamotte lived at Oxford from 1798 to 1803, when he moved to Great Marlow, Bucks. to become drawing master at the Royal Military College. A number of oil sketches of the Thames Valley made by him about this time are recorded. Several were in his sale at Sotheby's, 22–23 May 1863, including a ‘Road to Waterperry, Oxon’ (lot 108), which may perhaps be T01050.

Published in:
The Tate Gallery: Acquisitions 1968-9, London 1969