(Dredging)

Mabel Catherine Robinson Barnes

By all accounts, Mabel Catherine Robinson (later Barnes) was a prolific artist whose accomplishments in the field of art included her election to the Royal Academy of Painter-Etchers and Engravers in 1909, the RE’s very first female Associate. However, unlike many of her peers, such as Myra Kathleen Hughes, accounts of her life and full body of work are in relatively short supply.

Here, a simple but sure handed sketch of a dredging along a waterway encapsulates everyday life in the early 20th century. The landscape is low, the surface of the water glassy and reflecting a calm sky, and in the distance a fishing boat has unfurled its sail in the hopes of locating a good catch. This came from the collection of Danish critic, author, and collector Georg Brochner, and may have been an image of Brochner’s homeland. Denmark - and most of Scandinavia - was a popular destination for printmakers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Robinson-Barnes was both a painter and etcher of landscape subjects. She studied at Lambeth Art School and at the Royal Academy. For an article on her etchings, see the Studio Magazine, no. 25 (1909): 38. (Century, 69). References: A Century of of Master Drawings, Watercolours, & Works in Egg Tempera. London: Peter Nahum, nd. Catalogue number 16.

Provenance: From the collection of Danish critic and author Georg Bröchner (1874-1933) who wrote for the British art magazine "The Studio" in the early 20th century.