item details
NameSketch of a sailing ship no. 2
ProductionPetrus van der Velden; artist; circa 1867-1870; Rotterdam
Classificationoil paintings
Materialsoil paint, cardboard
Materials Summaryoil on cardboard
DimensionsSupport: 254mm (width), 355mm (height)
Registration Number1936-0012-123
Credit lineGift of the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts, 1936
Overview
Ships and harbours
When Petrus van der Velden decided to focus completely on his new profession as an artist in 1867, he began with studies of ships and harbours. This is unsurprising given that marine painting is a quintessentially Dutch genre of art.
Van der Velden developed few of the sketches into finished paintings, but the studies that remain provide a remarkable record of his working process. A reviewer who saw them exhibited in New Zealand in the early 1900s had this to say:
The honesty and truth of the painter are seen, too, in the collection of drawings of ships and boats. Here, block and line, rope and cable, are drawn in their proper place; nothing is missing, nothing skimped.