Well painted original watercolour miniature by the listed St Ives artist Edmund George Fuller RBA, RWA (1859 - 1940), painted circa 1920. 

Depicting a steep sided Gorge, with a river running through the bottom - as yet I have been unable to identify the location. This is a lovely little gem of a watercolour and a fine example of the artist's work.

Unsigned, but from a collection of 11 watercolours by the artist, half of which are signed - without doubt a work by Fuller.

Watercolour on wove paper. In a new, acid free, mount with backing sheet - ready to frame.

Watercolour in excellent original condition, with good colour (see photos). 

Image 9.6cm x 13.6cm, mount 18cm x 21.8cm.

Comes with our Certificate of Authenticity - guaranteed authentic and original.

This is one of a collection of 11 watercolours by Fuller that I have listed.

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Edmund George Fuller RBA, RWA 1858 - 1940

British marine and landscape painter in oils and watercolours.

On his death in 1940, Fuller was described as “painter, architect, comic artist and metal worker” and he distinguished himself in all these disciplines, but it was as a marine artist that he achieved the highest renown. The son of a military father, who became a General, Fuller was born in Brompton, London and educated at Sandhurst. He married Emma Wing, a Suffolk girl, in 1882 and they lived initially in London. He first started exhibiting in 1888 and was elected to the Royal Society of British Artists (RBA) in 1895. Until 1916 he showed work at the Royal Academy, Royal Society of Artists Birmingham, the Dudley Gallery and the RBA

Fuller came to St Ives in 1892, he and his wife taking part in the Carnival Masquerade held that March. They settled in 1 Barnoon Terrace and he immediately took a studio on the harbour beach, which was to be his workplace throughout his time in St Ives. This was a large space, which enabled him to have a fine lathe and carpenter’s bench at one end, where he did his metal working, and his easels, paints and canvases by the window overlooking the harbour at the other.

He was one of the first St Ives artists to exhibit pure seascapes at the RA. As early as 1894, a work simply called ‘Surf’ was illustrated as a Picture of the Year and a number of Fuller’s RA exhibits later in the decade, such as ‘Sun-Kissed Foam’ (1899) were pure seascapes of huge dimensions. After 1906, Fuller concentrated almost entirely on seascapes, capturing fascinating lighting effects on surf and in the sky. The smaller examples of these works tend to be the paintings that pass through the salerooms. These are attractive works that generate much interest and it is his masterful treatment of the sea and the bright shaft of light in the distance that are the key elements in these works. His obituarist commented, “He was much envied by other marine painters in the Colony, as he was the only sea artist who could sell his work in his studio, running often into three figures. I have known him make as much as £40 each for a couple of watercolours, painted from black lead sketching done at Clodgy.

It was his habit to always carry a sketch book, make plein air studied when something caught his eye and work up the sketches in watercolour back at his studio. This can be seen from the series of drawings of old St Ives, which Fuller reproduced and published in 1905 under the title ‘In and Around St Ives’.

Fuller was a founder member of the Royal West of England Academy (RWA), when it changed from the Bristol Academy, being granted royal status by George V in 1913. He is always mentioned as being a dapper little man of distinguished appearance, invariably wearing riding breeches, a corduroy coat and a Stetson hat. In 1913, he decided to move back into central St Ives, living at 6 Clodgy View. During the War, he worked in munitions and his paintings are rarely mentioned after the War, although he was represented in the Plymouth exhibitions of 1917 and 1922 and was a founder member of the New Print Society which had its inaugural exhibition at Lanham’s Galleries in 1923. In 1920, he was said to be busy illustrating a book on the Union Castle Line and its work during the war, but this does not appear to have come to fruition. He seems to have left St Ives in the mid-1920s – he resigned from the Golf Club in October 1924 – and he spent his last years at Portishead, near Bristol.

Examples of his work are held at the Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery.

Credit to David Tovey for his excellent research on the artist.