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William Westall (artist)
Encyclopedia
William Westall was an English
landscape artist best known as one of the first artists to work in Australia
.
, England
, but grew up in London
, mostly Sydenham
and Hampstead
. The son of brewery manager Benjamin Westall and his second wife Martha nee Harbord, William Westall had four step-siblings, the eldest of whom, Richard Westall
, was a reputable painter and illustrator. William was interested in painting from a young age; Rienitz and Rienitz (1963) suggest that he looked up to his half-brother, and was ambitious to follow in his footsteps. There is evidence to suggest that Westall's parents did not support this career choice; however Richard became head of the family upon the death of Benjamin Westall in March 1794, and must have approved Westall's artistic ambitions, as from that time forward William Westall was given a thorough art education. At the age of sixteen he won a silver palette in a competition run by the Society of Artists
, and at eighteen was enrolled at the prestigious Royal Academy
.
to serve as landscape and figure painter to a voyage of exploration under Matthew Flinders
. The position had first been offered to Julius Caesar Ibbetson
, who declined; and then William Daniell
, but accepted but subsequently pulled out. Daniell was a fellow student of Westall, and was engaged to one of Westall's stepsisters, so it seems likely that Westall prevailed upon Daniell to recommend him as his replacement; however one source states that Westall was recommended by Benjamin West
, President of the Royal Academy. Elisabeth Findlay reconciles these claims by suggesting that Daniell "contrived" to have West put Westall's name forward.
Westall's nomination was approved by Banks; thus Westall, at just 19 years of age, was appointed to what has come to be regarded as one of the notable scientific expeditions ever undertaken, as a member of a team of scientists that included botanist Robert Brown
and botanical artist Ferdinand Bauer
, both now revered as amongst the very best in their respective fields.
, its first landfall, on 1 August. The following day Flinders, Brown and Bauer rowed to Bugio Island
. The gardener Good
records that he was not permitted to go with them, so instead he and Westall rowed around the Investigator in search of turtle
s and birds, obtaining one of each. A day later the Investigator anchored at Funchal
, Madeira Island, and the following morning Westall went ashore with the other scientists, walking around Funchal and the vineyard
s north and east of the town. The next day the scientists went ashore again, with the intention of climbing the highest peak, Pico Ruivo
. They walked all day, then spent an uncomfortable night in an unfurnished room in a chapel, probably the old chapel at Alegría. Early the next morning Westall returned alone to Funchal, the others continuing on for a few hours before turning back.
Westall was charmed by the island and seems to have been enthusiastic in his work. However on returning to the ship, their boat was swamped, Westall was almost drowned, and all of his sketches were lost. This event seems to have profoundly affected him: it is claimed that he subsequently nearly died from exposure and stress, and even three years later he was claiming that "his head had been affected" by the accident. Throughout his life he maintained that the swamping was a deliberate act.
, in the Cape Colony
just east of the Cape of Good Hope
. Anchoring in False Bay
on 16 October, the Investigator remained eighteen days, during which time the scientists spent a good deal of time ashore. Nothing is known of Westall's movements in the first week, but Good, travelling with Brown, Bauer and ship surgeon Hugh Bell, reports falling in with him at Devil's Peak
on 26 October, Westall having set out from Simon's Town with mineralogist John Allen
two days earlier; the two men had become separated, and Westall had "fared very indifferently and slept one night at Constantia
." The following day Westall accompanied Bauer and Bell towards Cape Town
, while Good and Brown climbed Table Mountain
. Good and Brown slept that night in the Tokai
home of a German named Johann Gasper Loos, and woke in the morning to find Westall and Bell there too, the latter two having lost their way to Cape Town, and arrived at Loos' house late in the evening. All four men then returned to the ship together.
As with Madeira, Westall was delighted with the landscapes on offer at the Cape, and worked conscientiously, making some highly detailed sketches. Seven of Westall's field drawings from the Cape are extant.
. He made two further coastal profiles the following day, one of Chatham Island, the other of the Eclipse Islands. Late that night the Investigator anchored alongside Seal Island
in King George the Third's Sound (now King George Sound
); they would remain in King George Sound for almost four weeks.
The next morning, the 9th, Westall sketched Seal Island from the anchorage. Later that day he went with Flinders and others, firstly to examine Seal Island and search for a bottle and parchment that George Vancouver
had left there ten years previously. They then went across to Possession Point
and the opposite shore, and examined Princess Royal Harbour.
Not much is known of Westall's subsequent movements, but on 14 December he was on shore with Brown, Good, Westall, Allen, and possibly Bauer and a man named White, when they made the first contact with an Australian Aborigine, who initially advanced on them, shouting and brandishing a spear, but then retreated before them, setting fire to the grass behind him. On 23 December Westall was one of a large party who set off on a grueling two-day overland expedition to Torbay Inlet
and back.
By 30 December the Investigator' s men had established amicable relations with the Aborigines. That day Westall sketched an Aboriginal man named Warena, and showed it to him. Warena was pleased, and bared his body to the waist so that Westall could complete the drawing. A sketch of an Aboriginal man survives, and Rienitz and Rienitz assume that this is Warena, but Vallance et al. (2001) note that the sketch does not match Brown's description of Warena as a "middle aged stout man".
On 1 January 1802, Westall landed with Bauer, apparently in company with Brown, and apparently at Limeburner Point
. Westall and Bauer subsequently went exploring together, and discovered the Western Australian Pitcher Plant (Cephalotus follicularis).
From this time on, the surviving drawings by Westall decrease markedly in both number and quality. Findlay assumed that nearly all of Westall's drawings have survived, and sees the Westall's low output as indicative of his growing disillusionment with the Australian landscape, which he perceived as lacking in the picturesque
qualities he sought. Rienitz and Rienitz, on the other hand, perceive Westall as diligent enough, and assume that many of his drawing have been lost.
Only five sketches and a watercolour are extant from Westall's time in King George's Sound, and he seems to have made only one sketch during the five days spent in Lucky Bay
. At Cape Catastrophe, where eight men were drowned, Westall sketched Thistle Island
, and painted a snake
.
The arrival of the Investigator at the settlement at Port Jackson
(now Sydney
) on 8 May 1802 seems to have revitalised Westall. During there ten-week hiatus there, he produced a great deal of work, including no fewer than thirteen detailed drawings of the Hawkesbury River
, with which he was much taken. He also sketched some local Aborigines
, and was commissioned by the Governor, Phillip Gidley King, to paint Government House
. The resulting watercolour is one of a very few paintings that Westall completed during the voyage.
Heading north up the east coast, Westall continued drawing coastal profiles, but put less effort in than ever. Anchoring in Port Bowen on 21 August, the scientists went ashore to explore, and Flinders offered to name the highest mountain over whoever reached the peak first. Westall won; hence the name of Mount Westall
. Continuing north, the Investigator found a passage through the Great Barrier Reef
, passed through Torres Strait
, and anchored off Murray Island, where about fifty Torres Strait Islanders
came out in canoe
s to trade. From this time onward, Westall largely eschewed landscapes in favour of portraying events and people. Amongst his work in this perious is the watercolour Murray Isles, which depicts the islanders coming out to trade; The English Company's Islands: Probasso, a Malay Chief, a portrait of a Macassan trepanger chieftain; and several watercolour copies of Aboriginal cave painting
s. The last of these makes Westall the first European artist to depict Aboriginal cave paintings, and, more generally, one of the first Europeans to document Aboriginal artwork.
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By the time Flinders had finished surveying the Gulf of Carpentaria
, the Investigator was rotting badly, and Flinders reluctantly decided to return to Port Jackson via the west and south coasts. Arriving back at Port Jackson in June 1803, the Investigator was condemned, and Flinders decided to return to England to request a new ship. Though some of the scientists elected to remain in Port Jackson
and await Flinders' return, Westall joined Flinders as a passenger on the HMS Porpoise
. They set sail on 10 August, but a week later the ship was wrecked on the Wreck Reefs
, and the crew and passengers were marooned on a narrow sandbank for nearly three weeks while Flinders returned to Port Jackson in the Porpoise
. Westall decided to board the latter.
Very few of Westall's drawings were lost in the wreck, though some were water-damaged, and incurred further damage when Flinders' second lieutenant and brother Samuel Flinders allowed the sheep to run over them while Westall had them laid out drying in the sun. Whilst marooned on the sandbank, Westall produced a watercolour entitled View of Wreck Reef Bank Taken at Low Water: Terra Australia; this was Westall's final drawing of the voyage.
. As he was on the British government payroll at the time, he had no right to do so without permission, and must have known it, since, just before departing for India, he wrote a long letter to Banks justifying his travel plans. In doing so he complained about the monotony of the Australian landscape, declared that he would not have agreed to the position if he had known that the voyage was confined to Australia alone, and hinted that he had the right to go to India as compensation for the failure of the Investigator to stop anywhere interesting. The admiralty took a dim view of the letter, terminating his employment immediately, and telling him to make his own way home.
. Realising that he would not be asked to work his sketches up for some time, he sailed once more to Madeira, and then on to Jamaica
, returning to England in 1806.
By 1809, the Admiralty were feeling pressure to show some results of the voyage; yet Flinders still had not been released by the French, so a published account of the voyage was still some years off. To fill the void, the Admiralty commissioned Westall to produce nine oil painting
s of Australian scenes. These took Westall three years to complete. A selection were exhibited in 1810, and again in 1812, and as a result Westall won election as an Associate of the Royal Academy. When work on Flinders' A Voyage to Terra Australis
got underway in 1811, it was Westall's oil paintings that became the basis of the engravings to be published therein. Westall himself took responsibility for squaring down the paintings to drawings of the actual size to be published, and these were then handed over to engravers, who produced intaglio
plates using a combination of etching
and direct engraving. A Voyage to Terra Australis was eventually published in 1914, and shortly afterwards Westall published the engravings separately under the title Views of Australian Scenery.
In 1811 Westall published Foreign Scenery, a collection of landscapes depicting Madeira, the Cape of Good Hope, China and India. This was a financially successful venture, and attracted the attention of publisher Rudolf Ackermann, who approached him to contribute to several of his works. Westall ended up doing a good deal of work for Ackermann, including views of several universities and public schools for Ackermann's series of school histories; and over a hundred drawing for Great Britain Illustrated (1830). He also worked for John Murray
, such as several contributions to A Picturesque Tour of the River Thames (for which he shared authorship with Samuel Owen
1828).
Westall's health began to decline in the 1840s, and in 1847 he broke his arm. He never recovered from this setback, finding it difficult to continue working. He gave his final exhibition in 1848, and died in January 1850, aged 68. His grave is in the graveyard of St John-at-Hampstead
.
In 1899, Westall's sons sold 140 of the original drawings from the voyage of HMS Investigator to the Royal Colonial Institute (later the Royal Commonwealth Society
) for 100 guineas. In 1968 they were published as Drawing of William Westall; later that year they were purchased by the National Library of Australia
for 38,000 pounds.
But the main criticism levelled against Westall's Investigator work relates to his taking of artistic license. There was an expectation that Westall's pictures would be serve as accurate objective records, and in many cases they are: his coastal profiles in particular have been praised for their accuracy. In some cases, however, Westall has introduced substantial inaccuracies. When an Aborigine was shot in the back, Westall's sketch showed the gunshot wound in the chest; and his sketch of Wreck Reef shows emergent coral reef, when in fact the coral remained always underwater.
These inaccuracies were compounded when Westall came to convert his sketches into oil paintings. A devotee of the picturesque
aesthetic ideal, Westall sought to impose this ideal upon the Australian landscape. To this end he manipulated the foreground of his paintings heavily, rearranging and inserting features to obtain a desirable composition
. Examples include his Entrance to Port Lincoln from behind Memory Cove, February 1802, which superimposes the foreground from one sketch of Port Lincoln upon the background of another; and his Part of King George Sound, on the South Coast of New Holland, which is based upon his drawing of King George's Sound, but has a completely revised foreground, including the insertion of a Eucalyptus
that Westall sketched at Spencer Gulf
, 1800 kilometres to the east.
Westall's later work has not been subjected to much critical analysis, but his contemporary and friend John Landseer considered that he was under-rated, and a better artist than William Hodges
and John Webber
, the artists on James Cook
's second and third expeditions respectively. Landseer thought that Westall would have received more recognition, were he not "a mild and unobtrusive man, whilst the others were pushing and solicitous".
For developments in William Westall's life see www.westallart.blogspot.com and www.bradonpace.com/westall both developed with or by his great great grandson Richard J. Westall
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
landscape artist best known as one of the first artists to work in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
.
Early life
Westall was born in HertfordHertford
Hertford is the county town of Hertfordshire, England, and is also a civil parish in the East Hertfordshire district of the county. Forming a civil parish, the 2001 census put the population of Hertford at about 24,180. Recent estimates are that it is now around 28,000...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, but grew up in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, mostly Sydenham
Sydenham
Sydenham is an area and electoral ward in the London Borough of Lewisham; although some streets towards Crystal Palace Park, Forest Hill and Penge are outside the ward and in the London Borough of Bromley, and some streets off Sydenham Hill are in the London Borough of Southwark. Sydenham was in...
and Hampstead
Hampstead
Hampstead is an area of London, England, north-west of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Camden in Inner London, it is known for its intellectual, liberal, artistic, musical and literary associations and for Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland...
. The son of brewery manager Benjamin Westall and his second wife Martha nee Harbord, William Westall had four step-siblings, the eldest of whom, Richard Westall
Richard Westall
Richard Westall was an English painter and illustrator of portraits, historical and literary events, best-known for his portraits of Byron. He was also Queen Victoria's drawing master.-Life and works:...
, was a reputable painter and illustrator. William was interested in painting from a young age; Rienitz and Rienitz (1963) suggest that he looked up to his half-brother, and was ambitious to follow in his footsteps. There is evidence to suggest that Westall's parents did not support this career choice; however Richard became head of the family upon the death of Benjamin Westall in March 1794, and must have approved Westall's artistic ambitions, as from that time forward William Westall was given a thorough art education. At the age of sixteen he won a silver palette in a competition run by the Society of Artists
Society of Artists
The Society of Artists of Great Britain was founded in London in May 1761 by an association of artists in order to provide a venue for the public exhibition of recent work by living artists, such as was having success in the long-established Paris salons....
, and at eighteen was enrolled at the prestigious Royal Academy
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...
.
Voyages
In 1800, whilst still a probationary student in his first year, Westall was approached by Sir Joseph BanksJoseph Banks
Sir Joseph Banks, 1st Baronet, GCB, PRS was an English naturalist, botanist and patron of the natural sciences. He took part in Captain James Cook's first great voyage . Banks is credited with the introduction to the Western world of eucalyptus, acacia, mimosa and the genus named after him,...
to serve as landscape and figure painter to a voyage of exploration under Matthew Flinders
Matthew Flinders
Captain Matthew Flinders RN was one of the most successful navigators and cartographers of his age. In a career that spanned just over twenty years, he sailed with Captain William Bligh, circumnavigated Australia and encouraged the use of that name for the continent, which had previously been...
. The position had first been offered to Julius Caesar Ibbetson
Julius Caesar Ibbetson
Julius Caesar Ibbetson was a British 18th-century landscape and watercolour painter.-Early life and education:...
, who declined; and then William Daniell
William Daniell
William Daniell RA was an English landscape and marine painter, and engraver. He travelled extensively in the Far East, helping to produce one of the finest illustrated volumes of the period - "Oriental Scenery". He also travelled around the coastline of Britain to paint watercolours for the...
, but accepted but subsequently pulled out. Daniell was a fellow student of Westall, and was engaged to one of Westall's stepsisters, so it seems likely that Westall prevailed upon Daniell to recommend him as his replacement; however one source states that Westall was recommended by Benjamin West
Benjamin West
Benjamin West, RA was an Anglo-American painter of historical scenes around and after the time of the American War of Independence...
, President of the Royal Academy. Elisabeth Findlay reconciles these claims by suggesting that Daniell "contrived" to have West put Westall's name forward.
Westall's nomination was approved by Banks; thus Westall, at just 19 years of age, was appointed to what has come to be regarded as one of the notable scientific expeditions ever undertaken, as a member of a team of scientists that included botanist Robert Brown
Robert Brown (botanist)
Robert Brown was a Scottish botanist and palaeobotanist who made important contributions to botany largely through his pioneering use of the microscope...
and botanical artist Ferdinand Bauer
Ferdinand Bauer
Ferdinand Lucas Bauer was an Austrian botanical illustrator who travelled on Matthew Flinders' expedition to Australia.-Biography:...
, both now revered as amongst the very best in their respective fields.
Madeira
Leaving London on 18 July 1801, the expedition reached MadeiraMadeira
Madeira is a Portuguese archipelago that lies between and , just under 400 km north of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the north Atlantic Ocean and an outermost region of the European Union...
, its first landfall, on 1 August. The following day Flinders, Brown and Bauer rowed to Bugio Island
Bugio Island
Bugio Island is one of the Desertas Islands, a small chain of islands in the archipelago of Madeira, located to the southeast of the island of Madeira....
. The gardener Good
Peter Good
Peter Good was the gardener assistant to botanist Robert Brown on the voyage of HMS Investigator under Matthew Flinders, during which the coast of Australia was charted, and various plants collected.-Biography:...
records that he was not permitted to go with them, so instead he and Westall rowed around the Investigator in search of turtle
Turtle
Turtles are reptiles of the order Testudines , characterised by a special bony or cartilaginous shell developed from their ribs that acts as a shield...
s and birds, obtaining one of each. A day later the Investigator anchored at Funchal
Funchal
Funchal is the largest city, the municipal seat and the capital of Portugal's Autonomous Region of Madeira. The city has a population of 112,015 and has been the capital of Madeira for more than five centuries.-Etymology:...
, Madeira Island, and the following morning Westall went ashore with the other scientists, walking around Funchal and the vineyard
Vineyard
A vineyard is a plantation of grape-bearing vines, grown mainly for winemaking, but also raisins, table grapes and non-alcoholic grape juice...
s north and east of the town. The next day the scientists went ashore again, with the intention of climbing the highest peak, Pico Ruivo
Pico Ruivo
Pico Ruivo is the highest peak on the Madeira Islands. It can be reached only by foot, usually either from Pico do Arieiro after a strenuous hike, or from Achada do Teixeira with a shorter, easier trail. There is an additional trail leading west to Encumeada...
. They walked all day, then spent an uncomfortable night in an unfurnished room in a chapel, probably the old chapel at Alegría. Early the next morning Westall returned alone to Funchal, the others continuing on for a few hours before turning back.
Westall was charmed by the island and seems to have been enthusiastic in his work. However on returning to the ship, their boat was swamped, Westall was almost drowned, and all of his sketches were lost. This event seems to have profoundly affected him: it is claimed that he subsequently nearly died from exposure and stress, and even three years later he was claiming that "his head had been affected" by the accident. Throughout his life he maintained that the swamping was a deliberate act.
Cape Colony
The next landfall was at Simon's TownSimon's Town
Simon's Town , sometimes spelled Simonstown; is a town in South Africa, near Cape Town which is home to the South African Navy. It is located on the shores of False Bay, on the eastern side of the Cape Peninsula. For more than two centuries it has been an important naval base and harbour...
, in the Cape Colony
Cape Colony
The Cape Colony, part of modern South Africa, was established by the Dutch East India Company in 1652, with the founding of Cape Town. It was subsequently occupied by the British in 1795 when the Netherlands were occupied by revolutionary France, so that the French revolutionaries could not take...
just east of the Cape of Good Hope
Cape of Good Hope
The Cape of Good Hope is a rocky headland on the Atlantic coast of the Cape Peninsula, South Africa.There is a misconception that the Cape of Good Hope is the southern tip of Africa, because it was once believed to be the dividing point between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. In fact, the...
. Anchoring in False Bay
False Bay
False Bay is a body of water defined by Cape Hangklip and the Cape Peninsula in the extreme South-West of South Africa.- Description and location :...
on 16 October, the Investigator remained eighteen days, during which time the scientists spent a good deal of time ashore. Nothing is known of Westall's movements in the first week, but Good, travelling with Brown, Bauer and ship surgeon Hugh Bell, reports falling in with him at Devil's Peak
Devil's Peak (Cape Town)
Devil's Peak is part of the mountainous backdrop to Cape Town. When looking at Table Mountain from the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront, or when looking at the standard picture postcard view of the mountain, the skyline is from left to right: the spire of Devil's Peak, the flat mesa of Table Mountain,...
on 26 October, Westall having set out from Simon's Town with mineralogist John Allen
John Allen (miner)
John Allen was a lead miner, notable as a junior member of the party of naturalists that accompanied the 1801–1803 voyage of HMS Investigator under Matthew Flinders.-Early life:...
two days earlier; the two men had become separated, and Westall had "fared very indifferently and slept one night at Constantia
Constantia, Cape Town
Constantia is an affluent suburb of Cape Town, South Africa, situated about 15 kilometres south of the centre of Cape Town. The Constantia Valley lies to the east of and at the foot of the Constantiaberg mountain. Constantia Nek is a low pass linking to Hout Bay in the west.-History:Constantia is...
." The following day Westall accompanied Bauer and Bell towards Cape Town
Cape Town
Cape Town is the second-most populous city in South Africa, and the provincial capital and primate city of the Western Cape. As the seat of the National Parliament, it is also the legislative capital of the country. It forms part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality...
, while Good and Brown climbed Table Mountain
Table Mountain
Table Mountain is a flat-topped mountain forming a prominent landmark overlooking the city of Cape Town in South Africa, and is featured in the flag of Cape Town and other local government insignia. It is a significant tourist attraction, with many visitors using the cableway or hiking to the top...
. Good and Brown slept that night in the Tokai
Tokai, Cape Town
Tokai, a large residential suburb of Cape Town, South Africa, is situated on the foothills of the Constantiaberg, and is bordered by, Steenberg and Kirstenhof to the South, Bergvliet to the East, Constantia to the North and the SAFCOL pine tree plantations against the mountain to the...
home of a German named Johann Gasper Loos, and woke in the morning to find Westall and Bell there too, the latter two having lost their way to Cape Town, and arrived at Loos' house late in the evening. All four men then returned to the ship together.
As with Madeira, Westall was delighted with the landscapes on offer at the Cape, and worked conscientiously, making some highly detailed sketches. Seven of Westall's field drawings from the Cape are extant.
Australia
The Investigator came in sight of Australia on 6 December, and the following morning Westall made his first sketch of Australia, a coastal profile from about 15 kilometres off Cape LeeuwinCape Leeuwin
Cape Leeuwin is the most south-westerly mainland point of the Australian Continent, in the state of Western Australia.A few small islands and rocks, the St Alouarn Islands, extend further to the south. The nearest settlement, north of the cape, is Augusta. South-east of Cape Leeuwin, the coast...
. He made two further coastal profiles the following day, one of Chatham Island, the other of the Eclipse Islands. Late that night the Investigator anchored alongside Seal Island
Seal Island
Seal Island is a small land mass located 5.7 km off the northern beaches of False Bay, near Cape Town, in South Africa. The island is so named because of the great number of Cape Fur Seals that occupy it. There are a few sea birds as well. It is an outcrop of the Cape granite and rises no more...
in King George the Third's Sound (now King George Sound
King George Sound
King George Sound is the name of a sound on the south coast of Western Australia. Located at , it is the site of the city of Albany.The sound covers an area of and varies in depth from to ....
); they would remain in King George Sound for almost four weeks.
The next morning, the 9th, Westall sketched Seal Island from the anchorage. Later that day he went with Flinders and others, firstly to examine Seal Island and search for a bottle and parchment that George Vancouver
George Vancouver
Captain George Vancouver RN was an English officer of the British Royal Navy, best known for his 1791-95 expedition, which explored and charted North America's northwestern Pacific Coast regions, including the coasts of contemporary Alaska, British Columbia, Washington and Oregon...
had left there ten years previously. They then went across to Possession Point
Possession Point
Possession Point is a former point of land on the northwestern coast of Hong Kong Island in Hong Kong, before land reclamation moved the coast further north.- History :...
and the opposite shore, and examined Princess Royal Harbour.
Not much is known of Westall's subsequent movements, but on 14 December he was on shore with Brown, Good, Westall, Allen, and possibly Bauer and a man named White, when they made the first contact with an Australian Aborigine, who initially advanced on them, shouting and brandishing a spear, but then retreated before them, setting fire to the grass behind him. On 23 December Westall was one of a large party who set off on a grueling two-day overland expedition to Torbay Inlet
Torbay Inlet
Torbay Inlet is an estuarine inlet in the Great Southern region of Western Australia situated approximately East of Denmark.Torbay Inlet is a wave dominated estuary that functions primarily as a result of wave energy...
and back.
By 30 December the Investigator
On 1 January 1802, Westall landed with Bauer, apparently in company with Brown, and apparently at Limeburner Point
Limeburner Point
Limeburner Point is a point on the south coast of Shoal Bay, Princess Royal Harbour, on the south coast of Western Australia near Albany. It is located at , just west of the more prominent Limekilns Point....
. Westall and Bauer subsequently went exploring together, and discovered the Western Australian Pitcher Plant (Cephalotus follicularis).
From this time on, the surviving drawings by Westall decrease markedly in both number and quality. Findlay assumed that nearly all of Westall's drawings have survived, and sees the Westall's low output as indicative of his growing disillusionment with the Australian landscape, which he perceived as lacking in the picturesque
Picturesque
Picturesque is an aesthetic ideal introduced into English cultural debate in 1782 by William Gilpin in Observations on the River Wye, and Several Parts of South Wales, etc. Relative Chiefly to Picturesque Beauty; made in the Summer of the Year 1770, a practical book which instructed England's...
qualities he sought. Rienitz and Rienitz, on the other hand, perceive Westall as diligent enough, and assume that many of his drawing have been lost.
Only five sketches and a watercolour are extant from Westall's time in King George's Sound, and he seems to have made only one sketch during the five days spent in Lucky Bay
Lucky Bay
Lucky Bay is a bay located at on the south coast of Western Australia.It received its name from Matthew Flinders, who discovered it in January 1802. Flinders had sailed into the hazardous Archipelago of the Recherche, and found his ship surrounded by islands and rocks with nightfall coming on:...
. At Cape Catastrophe, where eight men were drowned, Westall sketched Thistle Island
Thistle Island
Thistle Island is located in the Spencer Gulf, South Australia, some 200 kilometres west of Adelaide, and just to the northwest of Gambier Island. The town of Port Lincoln lies to the northwest of the island. Between them, Gambier and Thistle form a small chain across the mouth of the gulf between...
, and painted a snake
Snake
Snakes are elongate, legless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes that can be distinguished from legless lizards by their lack of eyelids and external ears. Like all squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales...
.
The arrival of the Investigator at the settlement at Port Jackson
Port Jackson
Port Jackson, containing Sydney Harbour, is the natural harbour of Sydney, Australia. It is known for its beauty, and in particular, as the location of the Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge...
(now Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
) on 8 May 1802 seems to have revitalised Westall. During there ten-week hiatus there, he produced a great deal of work, including no fewer than thirteen detailed drawings of the Hawkesbury River
Hawkesbury River
The Hawkesbury River, also known as Deerubbun, is one of the major rivers of the coastal region of New South Wales, Australia. The Hawkesbury River and its tributaries virtually encircle the metropolitan region of Sydney.-Geography:-Course:...
, with which he was much taken. He also sketched some local Aborigines
Australian Aborigines
Australian Aborigines , also called Aboriginal Australians, from the latin ab originem , are people who are indigenous to most of the Australian continentthat is, to mainland Australia and the island of Tasmania...
, and was commissioned by the Governor, Phillip Gidley King, to paint Government House
Old Government House, Parramatta
Old Government House is a former "country" residence of 10 early governors of New South Wales, located in Parramatta Park in Parramatta, New South Wales, now a suburb of Sydney...
. The resulting watercolour is one of a very few paintings that Westall completed during the voyage.
Heading north up the east coast, Westall continued drawing coastal profiles, but put less effort in than ever. Anchoring in Port Bowen on 21 August, the scientists went ashore to explore, and Flinders offered to name the highest mountain over whoever reached the peak first. Westall won; hence the name of Mount Westall
Mount Westall (Queensland)
Mount Westall is a mount in Queensland, Australia, located at . It was named on 21 August 1802 by Matthew Flinders. Flinders, who was commander of the HMS Investigator, anchored in Port Bowen that day, and went ashore to explore with his party of scientists. He offered to name the highest visible...
. Continuing north, the Investigator found a passage through the Great Barrier Reef
Great Barrier Reef
The Great Barrier Reef is the world'slargest reef system composed of over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for over 2,600 kilometres over an area of approximately...
, passed through Torres Strait
Torres Strait
The Torres Strait is a body of water which lies between Australia and the Melanesian island of New Guinea. It is approximately wide at its narrowest extent. To the south is Cape York Peninsula, the northernmost continental extremity of the Australian state of Queensland...
, and anchored off Murray Island, where about fifty Torres Strait Islanders
Torres Strait Islanders
Torres Strait Islanders are the indigenous people of the Torres Strait Islands, part of Queensland, Australia. They are culturally and genetically linked to Melanesian peoples and those of Papua New Guinea....
came out in canoe
Canoe
A canoe or Canadian canoe is a small narrow boat, typically human-powered, though it may also be powered by sails or small electric or gas motors. Canoes are usually pointed at both bow and stern and are normally open on top, but can be decked over A canoe (North American English) or Canadian...
s to trade. From this time onward, Westall largely eschewed landscapes in favour of portraying events and people. Amongst his work in this perious is the watercolour Murray Isles, which depicts the islanders coming out to trade; The English Company's Islands: Probasso, a Malay Chief, a portrait of a Macassan trepanger chieftain; and several watercolour copies of Aboriginal cave painting
Cave painting
Cave paintings are paintings on cave walls and ceilings, and the term is used especially for those dating to prehistoric times. The earliest European cave paintings date to the Aurignacian, some 32,000 years ago. The purpose of the paleolithic cave paintings is not known...
s. The last of these makes Westall the first European artist to depict Aboriginal cave paintings, and, more generally, one of the first Europeans to document Aboriginal artwork.
Gulf of Carpentaria
The Gulf of Carpentaria is a large, shallow sea enclosed on three sides by northern Australia and bounded on the north by the Arafura Sea...
, the Investigator was rotting badly, and Flinders reluctantly decided to return to Port Jackson via the west and south coasts. Arriving back at Port Jackson in June 1803, the Investigator was condemned, and Flinders decided to return to England to request a new ship. Though some of the scientists elected to remain in Port Jackson
Port Jackson
Port Jackson, containing Sydney Harbour, is the natural harbour of Sydney, Australia. It is known for its beauty, and in particular, as the location of the Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge...
and await Flinders' return, Westall joined Flinders as a passenger on the HMS Porpoise
HMS Porpoise (1799)
HMS Porpoise was a 10-gun sloop originally built in Bilbao, Spain, as the packet ship Infanta Amelia. She was 308 tons, 93ft long on the gun deck and a beam of 27ft, 11 inches. On 6 August 1799 HMS Argo captured her off the coast of Portugal...
. They set sail on 10 August, but a week later the ship was wrecked on the Wreck Reefs
Wreck Reefs
The Wreck Reefs are located in the southern part of the Coral Sea Islands approximately 450 km East Nor East of Gladstone, Queensland or 250 km east of the Swain Reefs complex they form a narrow chain of reefs with small cays that extends for around 25 km in a west to east lineIslets...
, and the crew and passengers were marooned on a narrow sandbank for nearly three weeks while Flinders returned to Port Jackson in the Porpoise
Guangzhou
Guangzhou , known historically as Canton or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of the Guangdong province in the People's Republic of China. Located in southern China on the Pearl River, about north-northwest of Hong Kong, Guangzhou is a key national transportation hub and trading port...
. Westall decided to board the latter.
Very few of Westall's drawings were lost in the wreck, though some were water-damaged, and incurred further damage when Flinders' second lieutenant and brother Samuel Flinders allowed the sheep to run over them while Westall had them laid out drying in the sun. Whilst marooned on the sandbank, Westall produced a watercolour entitled View of Wreck Reef Bank Taken at Low Water: Terra Australia; this was Westall's final drawing of the voyage.
China and India
Westall arrived in Canton at the end of 1803. Rather than returning immediately to England, he spend some time exploring Canton, then sailed on to IndiaIndia
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. As he was on the British government payroll at the time, he had no right to do so without permission, and must have known it, since, just before departing for India, he wrote a long letter to Banks justifying his travel plans. In doing so he complained about the monotony of the Australian landscape, declared that he would not have agreed to the position if he had known that the voyage was confined to Australia alone, and hinted that he had the right to go to India as compensation for the failure of the Investigator to stop anywhere interesting. The admiralty took a dim view of the letter, terminating his employment immediately, and telling him to make his own way home.
Madeira and Jamaica
Westall returned to England at the end of 1804, only to learn that Flinders was imprisoned on MauritiusMauritius
Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...
. Realising that he would not be asked to work his sketches up for some time, he sailed once more to Madeira, and then on to Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...
, returning to England in 1806.
Career
Oil painting
Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...
s of Australian scenes. These took Westall three years to complete. A selection were exhibited in 1810, and again in 1812, and as a result Westall won election as an Associate of the Royal Academy. When work on Flinders' A Voyage to Terra Australis
A Voyage to Terra Australis
A Voyage to Terra Australis: Undertaken for the Purpose of Completing the Discovery of that Vast Country, and Prosecuted in the Years 1801, 1802, and 1803, in His Majesty's Ship the Investigator was a sea voyage journal written by English mariner and explorer Matthew Flinders...
got underway in 1811, it was Westall's oil paintings that became the basis of the engravings to be published therein. Westall himself took responsibility for squaring down the paintings to drawings of the actual size to be published, and these were then handed over to engravers, who produced intaglio
Intaglio (printmaking)
Intaglio is a family of printmaking techniques in which the image is incised into a surface, known as the matrix or plate, and the incised line or area holds the ink. Normally, copper or zinc plates are used as a surface, and the incisions are created by etching, engraving, drypoint, aquatint or...
plates using a combination of etching
Etching
Etching is the process of using strong acid or mordant to cut into the unprotected parts of a metal surface to create a design in intaglio in the metal...
and direct engraving. A Voyage to Terra Australis was eventually published in 1914, and shortly afterwards Westall published the engravings separately under the title Views of Australian Scenery.
In 1811 Westall published Foreign Scenery, a collection of landscapes depicting Madeira, the Cape of Good Hope, China and India. This was a financially successful venture, and attracted the attention of publisher Rudolf Ackermann, who approached him to contribute to several of his works. Westall ended up doing a good deal of work for Ackermann, including views of several universities and public schools for Ackermann's series of school histories; and over a hundred drawing for Great Britain Illustrated (1830). He also worked for John Murray
John Murray (publisher)
John Murray is an English publisher, renowned for the authors it has published in its history, including Jane Austen, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Lord Byron, Charles Lyell, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Herman Melville, and Charles Darwin...
, such as several contributions to A Picturesque Tour of the River Thames (for which he shared authorship with Samuel Owen
Samuel Owen (artist)
Samuel Owen was an English marine painter and illustrator.-Life and works:Owen was born about 1769. Nothing is recorded of him before 1791, when he exhibited "A Sea View" at the Royal Academy. This was followed in 1797, after the victory of Cape St...
1828).
Later life
In 1820, Westall married Ann Sedgwick; they would have four sons, William, Thomas, Richard and Robert. Supporting his family became the prime imperative of Westall's later life, and it is said that he often complained that he had sacrificed the change of fame and success in order to earn a steady income in illustration.Westall's health began to decline in the 1840s, and in 1847 he broke his arm. He never recovered from this setback, finding it difficult to continue working. He gave his final exhibition in 1848, and died in January 1850, aged 68. His grave is in the graveyard of St John-at-Hampstead
St John-at-Hampstead
St John-at-Hampstead is a Church of England church dedicated to St John the Evangelist in Church Row, Hampstead, London.-History:...
.
In 1899, Westall's sons sold 140 of the original drawings from the voyage of HMS Investigator to the Royal Colonial Institute (later the Royal Commonwealth Society
Royal Commonwealth Society
The Royal Commonwealth Society is an international educational charity and a private members' club. Its mission is to support and promote the modern Commonwealth, its culture and core values...
) for 100 guineas. In 1968 they were published as Drawing of William Westall; later that year they were purchased by the National Library of Australia
National Library of Australia
The National Library of Australia is the largest reference library of Australia, responsible under the terms of the National Library Act for "maintaining and developing a national collection of library material, including a comprehensive collection of library material relating to Australia and the...
for 38,000 pounds.
Assessment of his work
Westall's work during the voyage of the Investigator has been the subject of much analysis and comment, most of it critical. In terms of output, the 140 drawing he produced during the voyage compares unfavourably with the 2000 sketches produced by Bauer in the same period. Moreover some of Westall's drawings are so lacking in detail as to appear almost cursory. He has also been criticised for his choice of subjects: his primary task was to record landscapes, but in the latter half of the voyage he mostly neglected them in favour of portraying people and events.But the main criticism levelled against Westall's Investigator work relates to his taking of artistic license. There was an expectation that Westall's pictures would be serve as accurate objective records, and in many cases they are: his coastal profiles in particular have been praised for their accuracy. In some cases, however, Westall has introduced substantial inaccuracies. When an Aborigine was shot in the back, Westall's sketch showed the gunshot wound in the chest; and his sketch of Wreck Reef shows emergent coral reef, when in fact the coral remained always underwater.
These inaccuracies were compounded when Westall came to convert his sketches into oil paintings. A devotee of the picturesque
Picturesque
Picturesque is an aesthetic ideal introduced into English cultural debate in 1782 by William Gilpin in Observations on the River Wye, and Several Parts of South Wales, etc. Relative Chiefly to Picturesque Beauty; made in the Summer of the Year 1770, a practical book which instructed England's...
aesthetic ideal, Westall sought to impose this ideal upon the Australian landscape. To this end he manipulated the foreground of his paintings heavily, rearranging and inserting features to obtain a desirable composition
Composition (visual arts)
In the visual arts – in particular painting, graphic design, photography and sculpture – composition is the placement or arrangement of visual elements or ingredients in a work of art or a photograph, as distinct from the subject of a work...
. Examples include his Entrance to Port Lincoln from behind Memory Cove, February 1802, which superimposes the foreground from one sketch of Port Lincoln upon the background of another; and his Part of King George Sound, on the South Coast of New Holland, which is based upon his drawing of King George's Sound, but has a completely revised foreground, including the insertion of a Eucalyptus
Eucalyptus
Eucalyptus is a diverse genus of flowering trees in the myrtle family, Myrtaceae. Members of the genus dominate the tree flora of Australia...
that Westall sketched at Spencer Gulf
Spencer Gulf
The Spencer Gulf is the westernmost of two large inlets on the southern coast of Australia, in the state of South Australia, facing the Great Australian Bight. The Gulf is 322 km long and 129 km wide at its mouth. The western shore of the Gulf is the Eyre Peninsula, while the eastern side is the...
, 1800 kilometres to the east.
Westall's later work has not been subjected to much critical analysis, but his contemporary and friend John Landseer considered that he was under-rated, and a better artist than William Hodges
William Hodges
William Hodges RA was an English painter. He was a member of James Cook's second voyage to the Pacific Ocean, and is best known for the sketches and paintings of locations he visited on that voyage, including Table Bay, Tahiti, Easter Island, and the Antarctic.Hodges was born in London. He was a...
and John Webber
John Webber
John Webber was an English artist best known for his images of early Alaska and Hawaii.Webber was born on 6 October 1751 in London, educated in Switzerland and studied painting at Paris....
, the artists on James Cook
James Cook
Captain James Cook, FRS, RN was a British explorer, navigator and cartographer who ultimately rose to the rank of captain in the Royal Navy...
's second and third expeditions respectively. Landseer thought that Westall would have received more recognition, were he not "a mild and unobtrusive man, whilst the others were pushing and solicitous".
Publications
For a list of publications illustrated by Westall, see Wikisource:Author:William Westall.External links
- William Westall, Dictionary of Australian Artists Online.
- http://www.nla.gov.au/catalogue/pictures/Westall's works in the National Library of AustraliaNational Library of AustraliaThe National Library of Australia is the largest reference library of Australia, responsible under the terms of the National Library Act for "maintaining and developing a national collection of library material, including a comprehensive collection of library material relating to Australia and the...
, CanberraCanberraCanberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
] - Westall's work in the National Portrait Gallery (United Kingdom)
- http://www.nla.gov.au/exhibitions/travellersart/flinders.htmlWestall in the National Library of AustraliaNational Library of AustraliaThe National Library of Australia is the largest reference library of Australia, responsible under the terms of the National Library Act for "maintaining and developing a national collection of library material, including a comprehensive collection of library material relating to Australia and the...
's online exhibition Travellers Art(2003)] - 'William Westall', The Navigators - The Naturalists (ABC Learn Online)
For developments in William Westall's life see www.westallart.blogspot.com and www.bradonpace.com/westall both developed with or by his great great grandson Richard J. Westall