CHARLES SIMS
19 - 19
English SchoolrnrnCharles Sims lived at 14 Doris Street, Kennington from 1829 to 1841 and his first Royal Academy entry in 1829 uses that address. Then, subsequent to 1841, addresses elsewhere in London including Portland Place, Westminster Bridge Road and Golden Square were utilised. There has been some confusion as to the identity of other artists with very similar names (there is also a record of a G Simms a C Sims and a G Sims at the same address) but in Algernon Graves's British Institution and Royal Academy exhibition catalogues it states: "It is difficult to say whether the above list represents the work of two artists. C Sims is correct up to 1843 as he lived with G Sims, but he may have altered the spelling of his name in 1844." All the works under various spellings are of similar subjects and depict the same regions and are stylistically so close as to evince that they are one and the same and it simply could be that the name was misread on exhibition labels.rnrnSims was a prolific landscape painter in both oil and watercolour - some of which were of a significant size - whose work was popular during his career. He depicted scenes along the Thames and elsewhere in London as well as Windsor and the Home Counties of Kent and Surrey, Devon and also in Belgium and France. He had great skill in translating the effects of light on foliage and water on to his canvas which
English SchoolrnrnCharles Sims lived at 14 Doris Street, Kennington from 1829 to 1841 and his first Royal Academy entry in 1829 uses that address. Then, subsequent to 1841, addresses elsewhere in London including Portland Place, Westminster Bridge Road and Golden Square were utilised. There has been some confusion as to the identity of other artists with very similar names (there is also a record of a G Simms a C Sims and a G Sims at the same address) but in Algernon Graves's British Institution and Royal Academy exhibition catalogues it states: "It is difficult to say whether the above list represents the work of two artists. C Sims is correct up to 1843 as he lived with G Sims, but he may have altered the spelling of his name in 1844." All the works under various spellings are of similar subjects and depict the same regions and are stylistically so close as to evince that they are one and the same and it simply could be that the name was misread on exhibition labels.rnrnSims was a prolific landscape painter in both oil and watercolour - some of which were of a significant size - whose work was popular during his career. He depicted scenes along the Thames and elsewhere in London as well as Windsor and the Home Counties of Kent and Surrey, Devon and also in Belgium and France. He had great skill in translating the effects of light on foliage and water on to his canvas which
imbues them with a warmth and limpid glow.rnrnHe showed twenty-four works at the Royal Academy, thirty at the British Institute and sixty-three at the Royal Society of British Artists. Titles of exhibited paintings include: On the Thames; Battersea Bridge; View from Battersea Fields; Eton College; The Thames from Lambeth; Afternoon near Goudhurst; On the River Webber, Buckland, Devon; Fish Market, Calais; On the Scheldt; and Clearing up after a shower. The Victoria and Albert Museum has Coastal Scene at low tide - moonlight in its collection.rnrnrnBibliography: rnDictionary of British Landscape Painters - M H GrantrnDictionary of Victorian Painters - Christopher Woodrn
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