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Rhyl Sands
painting
Cox, David
Europe, United Kingdom
1854 (circa)
1917.170
First floor: Early 19th Century
Oil paint on canvas
45.8 x 63.5 cm
Rhyl Sands about 1854
David Cox 1783-1859
Oil on canvas
Cox enjoyed a long career as a watercolourist
before he took up oil painting in 1840.
North Wales was a favourite haunt of the artist
and Rhyl in particular is the subject of several pictures.
The freshness of this work suggests it was done outside,
anticipating French Impressionism of the later 1800s.
But Cox's method is rooted in a direct response
which is a recurring feature of Romantic British art.
Oil sketches were not produced for sale or exhibition,
but were preparatory studies for finished works,
or else personal exercises in their own right.
A larger, more finished version of Cox's Rhyl Sands
is in the Art Gallery at Birmingham, the city of his birth.
James Blair bequest 1917.170
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