Her First Litter
Watercolour
37x53cm
Signed Lower Right
Prov: Christopher Day Gallery NSW
Private Collection Adelaide.
$4,000-6,000
Exhibited: Christopher Day Gallery NSW, Purchased 1985, Australian Paintings 1820-1968, spring 1985 Cat No. 3 "Her First Litter'" 1881.
Royal Academy London 1881 Cat No. 760.
Lot.31 ALFRED WILLIAM STRUTT (1856–1924)
Alfred William Strutt was a distinguished British painter and etcher whose artistic career was closely associated with the traditions of nineteenth-century genre and animal painting. Born in Taranaki, New Zealand, in 1856, he was the son of William Strutt (1825–1915), one of the most significant artists working in colonial Australia during the mid-nineteenth century. His father was celebrated for his historical compositions, including the monumental Black Thursday, February 6th, 1851, and his extensive documentation of Australian colonial life.
Spending his early childhood in Australia before the family’s return to England in 1862, Strutt inherited a distinguished artistic tradition spanning several generations. He received his initial instruction from his father before undertaking formal studies at the South Kensington art schools in London. From 1879, he exhibited at the Royal Academy and other prominent British artistic institutions, establishing a successful career within the Victorian tradition of narrative and genre painting.
Strutt’s artistic practice encompassed sporting subjects, rural life and carefully observed representations of animals, frequently incorporating elements of humour, sentiment and narrative. His compositions demonstrate a refined understanding of anatomy and movement, together with the technical precision and descriptive detail characteristic of late Victorian painting. His work reflects the enduring popularity of domestic and sporting subjects among British collectors during the latter decades of the nineteenth century.
The substantial and finely executed watercolour Her First Litter, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1881, exemplifies Strutt’s accomplished treatment of domestic animal subjects. Depicting a mother and her litter, the composition combines intimate observation with the sentiment and naturalism characteristic of Victorian genre painting. Its ambitious scale, meticulous execution and early exhibition history provide a compelling example of Strutt’s technical accomplishment and his engagement with the artistic conventions of late nineteenth-century Britain.
