item details
Overview
William Westley Manning (1868-1954) was a British landscape painter, etcher and aquatinter. Born in Marylebone, London, he studied initially at the Slade School of Fine Art, at the Académie Julian, Paris in 1892, and then at the Central School of Arts and Crafts under Malcolm Osborne. He was a prolific exhibitor including the Baillie Gallery, Chenil Gallery, Fine Art Society, Goupil Gallery, New English Art Club, Royal Academy, Royal Institute of Oil Painters and at many other venues in England and abroad. He was elected RBA in 1901, Associate of the Society of Painter-Etchers (ARE), 1919 and member of the Royal Institute of |Painters (ROI), 1918; he travelled extensively and was a frequent visitor to Cornwall and a member of the St Ives Society of Artists 1938-49. His work is in many public collections including the Victoria & Albert Museum and the British Museum.
Manning depicted several views of Granada, a favourite artist/tourist locale, another of which, The Alhambra, Granada, is also in Te Papa's collection (1971-0012-12). This aquatint probably dates from the early to mid-1930s, before Spain was plunged into tragic civil war. As with the huge majority of such prints, Manning suppresses modern developments and stresses the old-world picturesqueness of the locale. The focal point is the church of Santa Ana, with a dramatically steep landscape on the right bank of the river Darro.
See: British Museum, 'William Westley Manning (Biographical details)', http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database/term_details.aspx?bioId=116016
Dr Mark Stocker Curator, Historical International Art May 2018