Sir John Lavery RA RHA RSA (1856-1941) Tangier, The White City Oil on canvas, 58.5 x 81cm (23 x 32'') Signed, inscribed and dated 1893 Provenance: Christie's, Modern British and Irish Paintings,...

Sir John Lavery RA RHA RSA (1856-1941) Tangier, The White City Oil on canvas, 58.5 x 81cm (23 x 32'') Signed, inscribed and dated 1893 Provenance: Christie's, Modern British and Irish Paintings, 21st November, 1995 where purchased by current owner. Exhibited: Ghent, 1902 Berlin, Schulte Gallery, John Lavery, 1904 London, Goupil Gallery, John Lavery, August 1908, no. 51. ''The Lure of the East - British Orientalist Painting'' traveling exhibition Yale Center for British Art , New Haven Feb/April 2008 Tate Britain, London June/August 2008 Suna and Inan Kirc Foundation Pera Museum, Istanbul Sept 2008/Jan 2009 ''Pioneering painters - The Glasgow Boys'' Exhibition Kelvingrove Art Galleryand Museum April - Sept 2010 Royal Academy of Arts Oct 2010 - Jan 2011 Cat. No. 92 Literature : W. Shaw-Sparrow, John Lavery and his Work, London, 1912, p 3, 184, 189. Kenneth McConkey, 'The White City - Sir John Lavery in Tangier'in The Irish Arts Review*, p 56, illustrated. Kenneth McConkey, 1993, Sir John Lavery, Edinburgh, 83, 92, illustrated Plate 102. Kenneth Mc Conkey ''John Lavery - a painter and his world'' 2010 illustrated P62 ''The Lure of the East, British Orientalism Painting'' Fig 108 Full page Illustration P125 Lavery first visited Tangier in Morocco in 1890. He had a long relationship with 'The White City', which his friend and fellow artist R.B. Cunninghame Graham had described thus: 'the chief note of Tangier is its whiteness. White houses, sands like snow, and, above all, a dazzling white atmosphere'. In 1903 Lavery bought Dar-el-Midfah, a small house in the hills outside Tangier which he continued to visit with his family for the next 20 years. Taking a high point the artist looks down on the beach with the city in the distance. This was worked up from 'Study for Tangier - White City' 1893. He emphasises in this painting the north African landscape and topography and these earlier paintings illustrate evidence of expeditions resulting in these photographic type snapshots, rather than engaging the viewer with Arab life and culture. McConkey states that ''many of them appear tentative and are athmospheric, almost Turner like in their effects''. We acknowledge the art historian, Prof. Kenneth McConkey, whose scholarly writings on Lavery form the basis of this catalogue entry.

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