Westminster Abbey, Hospital Etc

Location

Country: UK
City: London
Place: Government Art Collection

This view of 'Westminster Abbey, Hospital Etc' by Thomas Shotter Boys was published in 1842 as part of ‘Original Views of London As It Is’, his most successful volume. The volume included ‘Historical and Descriptive Notices of the Views’, written by the publisher, writer and editor Charles Ollier (1788-1859). Ollier’s text on this image begins:

‘Excepting the range of government offices in the distance, all the objects presented in this view are of Gothic character. The hospital to the left is a new building. Its architect has done wisely in adopting a style congenial with the time-hallowed edifice near which it stands. Westminster Abbey is one of the most interesting buildings in the metropolis. It is the place where the monarchs of England are crowned; and within whose sacred and solemn walls repose the ashes of kings, conquerors, statesmen, philosophers, and poets.’

Thomas Shotter Boys was born in Pentonville, North London. He was apprenticed to engraver George Cook, before moving to Paris during the 1820s. There he met Richard Parkes Bonington, with whom he worked. He returned to England in 1837 and initially engraved the designs of other artists and contributed to publications. In 1839, Boys produced his own publication, ‘Picturesque Architecture in Paris, Ghent and Antwerp’, the first English book with lithographic plates entirely in colour. He was elected a member of the New Water Colour Society in 1841 and in the following year published ‘Original Views of London As It Is’. Boys spent the last 20 years of his life teaching drawing and working as a lithographer. He died aged 71 in St John's Wood.

Places

England, London, Westminster

Subjects

carriage, horseback, topography, townscape/cityscape, Victorian Genre, horse, lamp post, street, hospital, abbey, church windows, tower

Materials & Techniques

lithograph, coloured lithograph

Artist

Thomas Shotter Boys (1803 - 1874)

Title

Westminster Abbey, Hospital Etc

Date

1842

Medium

Coloured lithograph

Acquisition

Purchased from Vicars Bros, September 1955

GAC number

3298