Thursday, September 1, 2016

Ionides collection I

William Blake Richmond
Mrs. Luke Ionides
1882
oil on canvas
Victoria & Albert Museum

Alphonse Legros
Constantine Alexander Ionides
1870s
drawing
Victoria & Albert Museum

Constantine Alexander Ionides (1833-1900) collected most of the art displayed here  and a great deal of other art besides. He was active in London toward the end of the 19th century, ultimately bequeathing the fruits of his acquisitiveness to the institution that would become the Victoria & Albert Museum. The museum's Constantine Ionides Bequest Study Guide gives a good description of the extended Ionides family as Victorian art patrons and collectors.

The French artist Alphonse Legros (1837-1911) became a political refugee in London after the failure of the Paris Commune in 1870-71. C.A. Ionides gave him extensive support, particularly  through commissions and purchases (as above and below). Other living artists collected by Ionides included members of the Arts & Crafts movement (like William Morris) and the pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (like Alma-Tadema, D.G.Rossetti, and Burne-Jones).

Alphonse Legros
The Tinker
1874
oil on canvas
Victoria & Albert Museum

Lawrence Alma-Tadema
The Visit - Dutch interior
1868
oil on canvas
Victoria & Albert Museum

George Frederick Watts
The Window Seat
1861
oil on canvas
Victoria & Albert Museum

George Frederick Watts
Constantine Alexander Ionides
1880
oil on canvas
Victoria & Albert Museum

Thomas Jeckyll
Perspective design for the billiard room at No. 1 Holland Park
 c. 1870
drawing
Victoria & Albert Museum

Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Head of Andromeda
1868
drawing
Victoria & Albert Museum

Edward Burne-Jones
Cupid's hunting fields
1880
drawing
Victoria & Albert Museum

Louis Le Nain
Travellers resting
1640s
oil on canvas
Victoria & Albert Museum

Jean Lemaire
Artist sketching among antique ruins
c. 1630
oil on canvas
Victoria & Albert Museum 

Jan van Goyen
River scene
1630
oil on oak panel
Victoria & Albert Museum

Henri Harpignies
The Fisherman
1886
watercolor
Victoria & Albert Museum
 
William Morris & Workshop
Tapestry : The Forest
1887
wool and silk
Victoria &Albert Musem

Nursery wallpaper with vignettes of the Seasons
c. 1850-75
woodblock print
Victoria & Albert Museum

Aimé-Jules Dalou
Miss Helen Ionides
c. 1879
terracotta bust
Victoria & Albert Museum