DUPERREY WATERCOLOURS BY ANTOINE CHAZAL

Turnbull Library Record, Volume 6, Issue 2, 1 October 1973, Page 35

DUPERREY WATERCOLOURS BY ANTOINE CHAZAL

A.A. St C. M. Murray-Oliver

One of the major items in the Lawson sale of the Dr Fox Collection earlier this year was a set of the published account of Duperrey’s voyage round the world in 1822-25, accompanied by an extra set of the handcoloured plates contained in the Atlas Historique of this work, a further proof set of these plates in black and white before titling and a set of the watercolours from which the plates were engraved. These paintings were executed by Antoine Chazal from sketches made on the voyage by Jules Le Jeune on board La Coquille. It is believed that all these had been the property of Duperrey. Because the sale catalogue was posted from England by sea, the Library missed the initial opportunity to purchase many highly desirable items, including the above, which passed into the possession of a Melbourne dealer, Kenneth Hince. The collection was inspected there in June last by Mr Murray-Oliver of the Library staff, on a visit to Australia, and a recommendation was made that the Endowment Trust should purchase the watercolours and the proof plates. This the Trust was enabled to do by a most generous grant that will be covered in a later issue, when there will also be given a detailed study of the Chazals. The paintings were delivered to the Library in August by Mr Hince who had earlier, most helpfully, given us the opportunity to acquire important manuscript lots similarly missed when the catalogue was issued.

Of the 56 subjects all but four are of the Pacific, 8 being of New Zealand content. In many instances they are of ethnographic as well as historical importance. This is a particularly welcome acquisition in that the Pacific aspect of the art collection is not as strong as one would wish and almost all the originals made by artists on the great French expeditions are held by institutions in France and are difficult of access. Added interest lies in the Library’s having published Dr Andrew Sharp’s Duperrey’s Visit to New Zealand in 1824, illustrated by some of the original Le Jeune sketches, for which the Library now holds the Chazal watercolours derived from them.