C51

gouache in b-n

From the second half of the 19th century, generic marine paintings gave way to “yacht portraits” depicting precise boats, identifiable in their shapes, sails and colours. These subjects, created by the great British masters of marine painting, belong to a typology that is almost unobtainable in Italy and are the result of a fashion that during the 19th century prompted ship-owners and sailing ship captains to commission professional painters to paint portraits of their vessels.
The painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy in London and belonged to the collector Beppe Croce: part of his collection can now be admired at the Galata Museo del Mare, in a room reproducing the interior of a late 19th-century English yacht club, inspired by the legendary Royal Yacht Squadron, the most prestigious nautical club in the United Kingdom. Gouache painting in shades of black and white depicting a group of men on board a yacht, caught in the act of greeting the people on board two boats passing by to the left in the background.