Peter Monamy

Peter Monamy was an English marine painter who lived between 1681 and 1749.

Early life and family

Peter Monamy was baptised at the church of St Botolph’s-without-Aldgate, London, England, on January 12, 1681 (NS). He was the last known surviving child of Peter, or Pierre, Monamy, born 1650 in Guernsey, and his English wife, Dorothy Gilbert; and the grandson of André Monamy, 1612-1680, who had been a strongly committed Commonwealth Parliamentarian in Guernsey during the 1650s. Dorothy Gilbert was the daughter of James Gilbert, who was Master of the Worshipful Company of Gunmakers in 1670 and 1672. The Monamy family had been prominent merchants and residents of Guernsey since at least the 1560s, and in the Channel Islands since the 1530s. The painter’s father, Pierre, had a brother named André, or Andrew, who was active in London as a merchant trader in salt and wool, during the late 17th and early 18th centuries.

On 3rd September, 1696, Peter Monamy, aged 15, was bound as an apprentice for seven years by indenture to William Clark, a former (1687) Master of the Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainers, one of London’s ancient guilds of craftsmen. Clark is recorded in several capacities in the London of the late 1600s, as a constable and juryman, with premises in Thames Street, and on London Bridge, and practised as what would today be called an interior decorator, with a thriving business. House decoration comprised a wide range of activities, including the provision of paintings as overdoors, and on panelling, house murals as well as decorative sign-boards for trade establishments.

Monamy was made free of his apprenticeship on March 1st, 1704 (new style), the same day as James Thornhill, a fellow Painter-Stainer, who later became the first native English painter to be knighted, and whose major work is the decoration of the Painted Hall of the Greenwich Naval Hospital, celebrating English naval prowess and the Protestant monarchy.

On the 17th April, 1706, a daughter of Peter Monamy, painter, and Margaret, is recorded as baptised with the name of Margaret, at St Olave’s, Bermondsey, near London Bridge, on the south bank of the Thames. The child's death is registered on 7th May, and it must be assumed that her mother also died. On 9th January, 1707 (new style), Peter Monamy is recorded as marrying Hannah Christopher, at Allhallows, London Wall.

Three children were born to Peter and Hannah Monamy in rapid succession: Andrew, baptised on 15 December, 1708, at St Botolph’s; Hannah, baptised on 5 March, 1710, at St Mary’s, Whitechapel; and another Andrew, baptised on 11 August, 1712, also at St Mary’s. As there is no further record of these children it must be assumed that all three died young, or in infancy. In 1708 the baptismal register records the couple as living in the Minories, near St Botolph’s; and in 1712 in Red Lion Street, near St Mary’s.

On October 6th, 1708, Monamy took on an apprentice, Henry Kirby, who was bound to him for seven years by indenture. Kirby was the son of Henry Kirby, citizen and gunmaker of London, and a member of the Company of Gunmakers.

Missing years

There follows a ten year gap in the recorded life events of the painter, as the next confirmed biographical item comes from the Westminster Poor Rate Book, which lists “Peter Monyman” in 1723, 1725 and 1728, as living in Fish Yard, off St Margaret’s Lane. Fish Yard was almost within the precincts of Westminster Hall, the seat of government, very close to Westminster Abbey, and St. Margaret's, Westminster, which is still the parish church of the House of Commons. A daughter, Anne, of Peter and Hannah Monamy, was baptised at St Margaret’s, Westminster, on 3 September, 1725.

At present it can only be conjectured what Monamy’s whereabouts may have been during the years between about 1714 and 1720. It is not impossible, however, that he spent some time in Cork, Ireland, which at this time was a hive of activity for English, and particularly Huguenot, craftsmen. There are two notable paintings by Monamy depicting yachts of the Royal Cork Yacht Club, which are still owned by the Club. Charles Brooking, father of the highly regarded marine painter, also named Charles (1723-1759), has left a record of his presence in Ireland; and William van der Hagen, another painter-decorator, and occasional marine painter, is also associated with the city of Cork. Another possibility is of a period of residence in Plymouth, where Charles Brooking Senior was involved in furbishing Rudyerd’s Eddystone Lighthouse. There is a striking painting of Henry Winstanley’s earlier Eddystone lighthouse by Peter Monamy, now in the Plymouth Museum. A second painting of Winstanley's lighthouse, as well as one of Rudyerd's, both by Monamy, are also known. During these years it may reasonably be conjectured that another daughter, Mary, would have been born to Peter and Hannah. There is no known record of her birth in London, but she later married Francis Swaine, on 26 June, 1749, at Allhallows, London Wall.

From the above records, and subsequent comments, it can reasonably be surmised that Monamy set up in business on his own account, both as a decorator and easel painter, quite soon after being made free in 1704. He is repeatedly mentioned in later accounts as having owned a shop on London Bridge. William Henry Pyne, an artist and raconteur (1769-1843) mentions that "Monamy, the marine painter, some of whose pictures were scarcely inferior to Vandevelde's, served his apprenticeship on London Bridge, and exhibited his works in the window of his shop, to the delight of the sons of Neptune, men and boys, who were seen in crowds gazing at his wondrous art."

Later life

On taking up residence as a studio painter, in Westminster in the early 1720s, Monamy’s practice to all appearances entered a new and highly prosperous phase. His standing as a Liveryman of the Painter-Stainer’s Company in 1726 was cemented by the donation to Painter’s Hall of what has been subsequently described as “"a fine piece of shipping"”, which is still in situ. Five large paintings, one dated 1725, were produced for Lord Torrington, (1663-1733) First Lord of the Admiralty from 1727, commemorating his naval triumphs. While establishing himself as London’s pre-eminent marine painter, Monamy will have continued to undertake commissions as a house decorator. There is extant a marine overmantel firmly attributable to him in a house in Old Burlington Street, near Bond Street, London, which is datable to 1728.

The climate during the early 1720s was exceptionally favourable, in terms of patronage and taste, for native English artists. Horace Walpole expressed it in these words: “"The new monarch was devoid of taste … it was more natural to George I to be content with, or even partial to whatever he found established, than to seek for improvement and foreign ornament." This climate changed, radically, both politically and aesthetically, during the years from 1730 to 1740, and during this decade Monamy would have found that his practice became increasingly hard-pressed, as it met with the censure of groups of self-appointed arbiters of taste, and the importation of quantities of old master paintings from Italy and France, as well as of artists and aesthetic concepts from the continent. These were sufficiently detrimental to native English practitioners to drive William Hogarth, Monamy’s close contemporary, to expressions of near-fury.

Hogarth is credited with hitting upon the idea of using the opening in 1732 of Vauxhall Gardens, a pleasure resort for Londoners, as a show-place for native English paintings. Monamy supplied at least four prominently displayed naval scenes for the Gardens. These are now lost, but known from engravings. A substantial number of prints, in mezzotint and line, after Monamy’s works, were produced in the years from about 1730 until just before his death in 1749. These continued to be reproduced, in some quantity, until well into the 19th century.

During his final years many of Monamy’s paintings can be closely associated with the naval exploits of several English fleet officer members of the Durell family of Jersey, and the de Sausmarez family of Guernsey, who were themselves linked by multiple marriage ties. In the period preceding Britain’s crucial first bid for global naval supremacy, at Porto Bello in 1740, and during the mounting opposition to the appeasement policies and other political measures of Robert Walpole, England’s long-serving Premier Minister, these sea-captains were among the most active and vociferous of his opponents. Monamy painted numerous versions of Admiral Vernon's capture of Porto Bello, including a canvas for public display at Vauxhall Gardens. Monamy continued as the marine painter most esteemed by active serving seamen, even during his slow financial decline and loss of aristocratic patronage, and for many decades after his death. In 1749 George Vertue expressed this reputation: “"his industry and understanding in the forms and buildings of shipping with all the tackles ropes & sails &c which he thoroughly understood made his paintings of greater value; besides his neatness and clean pencilling of sky and water by many was much esteemed, especially sea-faring people, officers & others, merchants &c."” Joseph Highmore noted, in 1766, that "A sailor … is a better judge of the principal circumstances which enter into the composition of a sea-piece, than the best painter in the world, who was never at sea."

Vertue goes on to relate that "he lived some years latter part of his life at Westminster near the river side, for the conveniency in some measure of viewing the water & sky; though he made many excursions towards the coasts and seaports of England to improve himself from nature [...] thus having run thro' his time [...] being decayed and infirm some years before his death, which happened at his house at Westminster the beginning of Feb 1748/9 [...] leaving many paintings begun and unfinished, his works being done for dealers at moderate prices [...] kept him but in indifferent circumstances to his end." Monamy was buried in St Margaret’s Church on 7 February, 1749.

These “indifferent circumstances” have been over-stressed in many later accounts of Monamy’s life. Well over a year after his death, on July 26, 1750, his studio possessions, pictures, prints, drawings, ship models, furniture and collection of china were auctioned, the sale lasting a full day. His house, which he must have moved into from Fish Yard some time after 1730, was described in the auctioneer’s advertisement as “"next to King Henry VIIth’s Chapel, in Old Palace Yard"”, at the east end of Westminster Abbey. The building is noticeable in an engraving of the Abbey by Samuel Wale included in Dodsley’s "London and its Environs Described", 1761. However, it is clear that Monamy’s two daughters, Mary and Ann, and more particularly his widow, were left in financial difficulties.

Ann Monamy had married Thomas Cornwall, an apothecary, on 14 Feb, 1745, at St George’s Chapel, Mayfair, and their eldest son, Peter Monamy Cornwall, was baptised on 20 January, 1747, at St Margaret’s, Westminster. Four months after Peter Monamy’s death Mary Monamy married Francis Swaine on 29 June, 1749, at Allhallows, London Wall. Their second child, and only known son, was baptised Monamy Swaine on 27 Feb, 1753, at St Dunstan’s Stepney.

The range of Monamy’s painting oeuvre is remarkably wide and varied, and it is apparent that in his prime he must have headed a considerable studio, and that a number of younger and older assistants would have participated in studio productions during his 45 year career. It is very probable that Charles Brooking was one of these, during the late 1730s and early 1740s. Francis Swaine, who became a highly regarded marine painter from about 1758 onwards, is explicitly referred to as “Old Swaine, pupil of Monamy”, in a memoir of Admiral Sir George Young, who had taken part in the Capture of Louisbourg, Nova Scotia, 1758. Monamy Swaine also became a marine painter.

Although Monamy’s fame, and standing as a marine painter, was unquestioned until about 1840, later art-historical comment, especially during the 20th century, has tended to disparagement. It was nevertheless still possible for Julian Marshall, a member of the South Kensington National Art Library, to note in a publication dated 1895, that, after completing his apprenticeship, Monamy had been “"reckoned the finest painter of shipping in England."”

References

* [http://www.familysearch.org Parish Register Collection of the Latter Day Saints (IGI)]
*Calendar of State Papers Domestic of Charles II
*Guildhall Archives
*Westminster City Archives
*British Library Archives
*"Bulletin" of the Société Jersiaise
*"Transactions" of the Société Guernésiaise
*"Essays, Moral, Religious, and Miscellaneous", Joseph Highmore, 1766
*"Ambulator: or ... a Tour round London", J.Scatcherd, 1774
*"Complete Works", Horace Walpole, Lord Orford, 1798
*"Gentleman's & Connoisseur's Dictionary of Painters", Matthew Pilkington, 1798
*"London & its Neighbourhood", David Hughson, 1806
*"Wine & Walnuts", W.H.Pyne, 1823
*"Nollekens & His Times", J.T.Smith, 1828
*"Catalogue of Engraved National Portraits", Julian Marshall, 1895
*"History of the Painter-Stainer's Company", W.A.D. Englefield, 1923
*"Young of Formosa", Sir George Young, 3rd Bt., 1927
*"Vertue Notebooks", George Vertue, Notebooks I-V and VI, first published by The Walpole Society, 1929-1942 & 1948-1950
*"Mid-Georgian London", Hugh Phillips, 1954
* [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1026/is_n2_v151/ai_19279610 "The Vernacular Art of the Artisan in England", James Ayres, The Magazine Antiques, Feb, 1997]
*"Charles Brooking (1723-59) and the 18th Century Marine Painters", David Joel & James Taylor, 1999, ISBN 978-1851492770
*"Eddystone: The Finger of Light", Mike Palmer, Seafarer Books, 2005, ISBN 0 9547062 0 X
*"A History of the Royal Cork Yacht Club", Alicia St.Leger, 2005
*"The History of The Worshipful Company of Painters", Alan Borg, 2005, ISBN 1-905217-05-6
*"The Worshipful Company of Gunmakers: A History", Derek Stimpson (ed), 2008, ISBN 978-0-9559032-0-5

External links

* [http://www.cichw.net/pm1.html Biographical website for Peter Monamy]
* [http://www.nmm.ac.uk/mag/pages/mnuInDepth/Biography.cfm?biog=219 National Maritime Museum biography of Peter Monamy]
* [http://www.artcyclopedia.com/artists/monamy_peter.html Guide to the works of Peter Monamy in galleries and museums]