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Overview
Born in London into a family with strong artistic connections, Martin Hardie (1875-1952) practised art throughout his youth and was well educated, reading classics at Trinity College, Cambridge. However, it was on his appointment as second-in-command of the newly-formed Department of Engraving, Illustration and Design at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, that he determined to acquire a working knowledge of the techniques of printmaking. Later, in 1921, he would be promoted to Keeper of Prints and Drawings. Fortunately for Hardie, the Royal College of Art was housed in part of the museum buildings at the time. Consequently, he was able to attend the etching classes of Sir Frank Short, who took him in as his protégé. Consequently Hardie came into contact with almost all of the leading printmakers and printers of the time. By 1908 he had become an Associate of the Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and by 1920 he was both a Fellow and Honorary Secretary of the Society and of the Print Collectors' Club.
Aside from his considerable output as an etcher and watercolourist, Hardie was an important writer and cataloguer on the prints of the British Etching Revival, producing the leading catalogues on the works of Sir Frank Short, James McBey and others, as well as leading the revival of interest in the work of the 19th century Romantic artist, Samuel Palmer. Hardie's three-volume Watercolour Painting in Britain was published after his death between 1966 and 1968. James Laver, who worked under Hardie at the V & A, called him 'the most considerate of chiefs, the most helpful of guides, the most delightful of friends' and said 'his is a refined and delicate talent founded upon good draftsmanship and an exquisite sense of atmosphere'.
In this drypoint, Hardie depicts rowboats and sailboats moored in the still water of an inlet canal, the sails furled tightly.Several houses stand on the docks, and small figures of people are moving around. A street lamp lights up one end of the area, and the boats are reflected in the water as the sun sets. The location, Heybridge basin, is a charming spot to the east of the small Essex town where the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation Canal merges into the tidal Blackwater Estuary, fed by the rivers Chelmer and Blackwater. The two rivers are joined by a lock which is regularly used by pleasure boats today. Sunset at Heybridge was the Chicago Society of Etchers presentation print of 1924.
See:
Campbell Fine Art, 'Martin Hardie', http://www.campbell-fine-art.com/artists.php?id=218
Tonbridge History, 'Martin Hardie', http://www.tonbridgehistory.org.uk/people/martin-hardie.htm
Dr Mark Stocker Curator, Historical International Art June 2018