Roy Precious - Antiques & Fine Art has dated this piece to the Before 1700 period.
The artist captures the beauty of the heavily gunned ships of the line with their sterns carved with the elaborate gilt 'gingerbreading' fashionable at this time.
These warships were the most powerful weapon on earth, with the fire power of an artillery regiment.
ADRIAEN VAN DEEST (1655-1704) was born at the Hague, the son of Jeronymus van Diest, a painter of sea-pieces, by whom he was instructed in the art. When he was seventeen years old he moved to London, where he was employed by Granville, Earl of Bath, for whom he painted several views and ruins in the west of England.
He also painted portraits, but did not meet with much encouragement, although his pictures possess considerable merit; as a proof of which Horace Walpole states that there were seven pictures by Van Diest in Sir Peter Lely's collection. He etched several landscapes from his own designs, in a slight, masterly style. Van Diest died in London in 1704.
SIZE: 31 x 49.5 inches inc. frame.
PROVENANCE: Berkshire Private Collection.
Verso: framers's labels.
Roy Precious - Antiques & Fine Art has dated this piece to the Before 1700 period.
Roy and nadine precious: specialists in portraiture from the 16th to the 20th century. Established in 1972.
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British Warships Off a Mediterranean Coast C.1675; Circle of Adriaen Van Deest.
