Yale Center for British Art

Creator:
James Hakewill, 1778–1843, British
Title:
Lyssons Estate, St. Thomas in the East, Jamaica
Date:
between 1820 and 1821
Materials & Techniques:
Watercolor and graphite on moderately thick, slightly textured, cream wove paper
Dimensions:
Sheet: 12 1/8 × 16 1/2 inches (30.8 × 41.9 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:
Lettered below image in graphite: "LYSSONS ESTATE ST. THOMAS IN EAST JAMAICA | THE PROPERTY OF G.W. TAYLOR ESQ M.P"
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1977.14.1962
Classification:
Drawings & Watercolors
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
estate | hills | cattle | landscape | ships | ocean | trees | figures | building
Associated Places:
North and Central America | Jamaica
Currently On View:
Not on view
Exhibition History:
Art and Emancipation in Jamaica: Isaac Mendes Belisario and his Worlds (Yale Center for British Art, 2007-09-27 - 2007-12-30)
Publications:
Timothy J. Barringer, Art and Emancipation in Jamaica: Isaac Mendes Belisario and His Worlds, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 2007, pp. 346-47, no. 72, N8243 S576 B37 2007 OVERSIZE (YCBA)
Gallery Label:
Hakewill's watercolor Lyssons Estate, St. Thomas in the East, Jamaica emulates J. M. W. Turner's "Plymouth Dock from Mount Edgecumbe." But while the landscape is composed in a Turneresque fashion, the crucial difference between Plymouth and Jamaica lay in the existence of slavery. The figures of enslaved Africans placed by Hakewill at the lower right contrast with Turner's boisterous group of sailors, the embodiment of English liberty.\n\n Both these estates were owned by the Taylor family, immensely wealthy planters. The "Change of Air House" was described by Hakewill as being "for the use of convalescents on the estate." This, however, refers only to the white population. The "slave hospital," where terrible suffering was endured, was a very different environment.\n\n Gallery label for Art and Emancipation in Jamaica: Isaac Mendes Belisario and his Worlds (Yale Center for British Art, 2007-09-27 - 2007-12-30)
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:27681