Name/Title
Caen with Cathedral in BackEntry/Object ID
2019.10.01Description
Painting
This image depicts a streetscape in an old part of Caen with multi-story buildings with people walking and shopping. A woman with a shopping basket in a white apron is to the front right, with a cathedral in the background. The composition is the result of careful observation and leads the eye down the street, with softly rich colours depicting building façades and their street-level shops with a certain sun-baked quietude.
While the church depicted in the background cannot be identified for certain, it is likely the Romanesque Abbey of Sainte-Trinité, formerly l'Abbaye aux Dames, East of the Caen Castle, this Benedictine nunnery was founded concurrently with the founding of the Abbey of Saint-Étienne, a Benedictine monastery, to the west of the Caen Castle by William the Conqueror and his wife Matilda of Flanders in the late 11th century.Artwork Details
Medium
Watercolour on paperSubject Place
Region
Western EuropeContinent
EuropeContext
Pemberton studied abroad and was well-traveled including England, France and the U.S.A. This painting of Caen may have been done during her studies or exhibitions in France or perhaps on a sketching trip or a vacation purely for pleasure.
Caen is a port city, the capital city of Basse-Normandie and Calvados, in northern France's Normandy region on the Orne River, some 14 km from the English Channel. Caen is known for its historical buildings built during the reign of William the Conqueror, who was buried there, and for the Battle for Caen in World War II, when heavy fighting that took place in and around the city during the Battle of Normandy in 1944. Much of the city was destroyed, and very little remains of the old town.
After the war, complete districts of the city were reconstructed. And Caen has preserved these memories by erecting a memorial and a museum dedicated to peace, the Mémorial de Caen. Its Château de Caen, a castle built ca. 1060 by William the Conqueror, who successfully conquered England in 1066, is one of the largest medieval fortresses of Western Europe. It houses the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Caen (Museum of Fine Arts of Caen) and the Musée de Normandie (Museum of Normandy)
Of note, The Canadian Army Film and Photo Unit filmed the D-Day offensive. The unit returned to document the city's recovery efforts, and the resulting film, "You Can't Kill a City", is preserved in Library and Archives Canada.Made/Created
Artist Information
Attribution
Sophie Theresa Pemberton Beanlands Deane-Drummond RCA, (1869-1959)Role
PainterDate made
1895Time Period
19th CenturyNotes
ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Born in Victoria, B.C., Sophie Theresa Pemberton Beanlands Deane-Drummond was considered to be B.C.'s first professional woman artist and one of the first Canadian women to seek a professional career abroad. She was one of the daughters of Joseph Pemberton, Surveyor-General, Crown Colony of Vancouver Island. She studied art in San Francisco, at the Slade School of Art in London, England then at the Académie Julian, Paris where in 1899 she was the first woman to receive the Gold Medal, an annual award for the best work done in all 27 student ateliers. The following year she was the first Canadian to win the Prix Smith-Julian for her portraiture.
Pemberton showed her work at the Royal Academy, the Paris Salon, and at the Louisiana Purchase Exhibition. Alternating between living in England and Victoria, she also had a solo show in Victoria in 1902 and 1904, and in Vancouver in 1904 at the studio of artist James Blomfield (1879-1951). She also had work in Island Arts and Crafts Society exhibitions in 1916, 1921, and 1922. She had many further solo exhibitions over the years, including at the Little Centre in Victoria; two shows at The Art Gallery of Greater Victoria; and a major retrospective at the Vancouver Art Gallery in 1954. Reportedly, she had 18 solo exhibitions.
Pemberton moved from the academic realism she had been taught in various art schools to aspects of French Symbolism and Impressionism which she brought to Canada's West Coast. To her advantage, she had connections with numerous artist friends and patrons, and her exhibitions drew favorable reviews from both critics and the public. She painted portraits, landscapes, delicate watercolour botanicals and the occasional study of family life. Unfortunately, marriage and family demands, and her own ill-health were to draw her away from her art. Pemberton’s last major exhibition was a solo exhibition in 1909 at the Doré Gallery, New Bond Street in London, to display her new-found talent for “en plein air” landscape painting.
In 1921 Pemberton returned to Victoria and it was reported that she visited the studio of Emily Carr (1871--1945) alerting the photographer Harold Mortimer-Lamb (1872-1970) to the presence of a major and unrecognized talent living in the city; he in turn alerted Eric Brown, the then-director of the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, setting in motion a chain of events that eventually brought Carr’s work to light. Pemberton resettled in London, where she stayed for nearly 20 years surviving the Blitz of 1940. Eventually she returned to her home town on the Oak Bay waterfront.
The Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, the Vancouver Art Gallery and the Art Gallery of Hamilton hold Pemberton’s works. Much of her work is in private collections. An unusual, but readily-accessible, place to view her painting is the entrance arch to the Pemberton Memorial Chapel at the Royal Jubilee Hospital, Victoria.Inscription/Signature/Marks
Type
LabelLocation
In file: multi labels from verso frame backing -
Handwritten in red felt pen on self-adhesive label:
88 CAEN CATHEDRAL / WATERCOLOUR / NOT IN CATALOGUE / MR. MRS. P. DUKE
Handwritten in blue ballpoint pen on on self-adhesive label:
LONG TERM LOAN / MR. DUKE
Handwritten in pencil on paper dust cover fragment (fragile with tape):
CAEN with Cathedral in back ...
...'95
Also on fragment, gold-printed black paper framers label:
PICTURES and FRAMES
PHOTOGRAPHIC MATERIALS
OTHER THINGS TOO
C. H. SMITH & CO.
611? FORT ST. VICTORIA, B.C.Dimensions
Dimension Description
SupportHeight
34.9 cmWidth
20.3 cmAcquisition
Acquisition Method
PurchaseDate
Aug 13, 2019Notes
Lunds Lot #109
