The artist and companions from the Astrolabe in the rainforest at Carteret Harbour, New Ireland (1827).

A$150,000 · Offered by Douglas Stewart Fine Books

Watercolour and ink on paper, 398 x 287 mm (entire sheet); contemporary inscription in ink to verso: 80. Vue du grand torrent et d une forêt / Hâvre Carteret ; the artist s own re-worked section (80 x 110 mm, irregular) carefully pasted on at lower left; short closed tear at right edge; extremely well preserved. A very early depiction of French explorers in the virgin equatorial landscape of Island Melanesia, painted by Louis-Auguste de Sainson, the official voyage artist on Dumont d Urville s famous 1826-29 expedition in the Astrolabe . From a historical perspective, this painting is of great significance as a rare example of early nineteenth-century Pacific voyage art. More specifically, its rarity is underlined by the fact that there are no finished watercolours by Sainson held in public collections in either Australia or New Zealand. Despite the best efforts of David Scott Mitchell, Sir William Dixson and Rex Nan Kivell the latter of whom at one stage spent 35 years tracking down a painting ascribed to Louis Auguste de Sainson in his quest for a prize acquisition (Sasha Grishin, Paradise possessed : the Rex Nan Kivell Collection. Canberra : NLA, 1998, p. 6) the only original works by Sainson from the voyage of the Astrolabe held by an Australian institution are the group of unsigned preparatory pencil sketches contained alongside many signed and dated sketches by Arago from the circumnavigation in the Uranie in an album in the SLNSW (Accession no. PX*D 150) purchased from

• Binding: Hardcover

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