Foster 35, 37, 40, 45-46, 48

LAMBERT, GEORGE (1710-85) and SCOTT, SAMUEL (1710-72)

Lambert was a landscape and scene painter, working for the Lincoln’s Inn Fields Theatre and after 1736 for Covent Garden. He was a friend of Hogarth, first President of the Society of Artists and founder of the Beefsteak Club.

Scott was an architect, landscape and marine painter who often painted in water-colours. He also was a friend of Hogarth and formed one of the famous Gravesend party. In 1771 he was living at Bath and exhibited a view of the Tower of London at the Royal Academy.

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F35, F37, F40, F45-46, F48

Six paintings commissioned by the East India Company, c.1730.

The purchase of this set of pictures depicting the chief settlements in the East Indies and on the route out, is recorded in the Court Minutes, 1 November, 1732. ‘Ordered that the Secretary do pay Mr. George Lambert £94.10s for Six Pictures of the Forts etc for the Court Room at fifteen Guineas per Picture as per agreement.’ It is most probable that Lambert painted the buildings and landscape in each picture and Scott added the ships. Neither artist went to India and the paintings must have been based on existing material. This data, however, was probably reliable and the pictures are therefore of importance for early Anglo-Indian topography. On 2 November 1733 (see Court Minutes) Lambert applied for permission to make copies of the series. The whereabouts of only two of these is known - ‘Fort St. George, Madras’, which was purchased in January 1911 by the Madras Government. (See H.D. Love, ‘Vestiges of old Madras’ (London, 1913), ii, 93-4) and ‘Table Bay’ in the Fehr collection (see A. Gordon Brown ‘Pictorial art in’ ‘South Africa’ (London, 1952).

Two sets of engravings were made from this series. In December 1734 permission was given to John Bowles, who employed Elisha Kirkall and in about 1736 another set was made by Gerard van der Gucht (1696-1776).

Literature: R. Kingzett. ‘A catalogue of the works of Samuel Scott’, ‘Walpole Society journal’ (1980-82) vol. 48, 68-72; Brian Allen, 'The East India Company's settlement pictures: George Lambert and Samuel Scott', ‘Under the Indian sun: British landscape artists’, ed. P. Rohatgi and P. Godrej (Bombay, 1995), 1-16.