News & Press

Victorian Monster Hits EWB!

Our Fine Art & Antiques Auction, scheduled to take place on 28 January 2025, will include artwork from a number of different genres, but we’d like to spotlight one painting in particular, signed by an artist called ‘Nap’.

The fantastical creature featured in this late-Victorian painting by Nap was likely to have been made originally for the ‘microbe series’ of 19th c. postcards, which were quite popular at the time. Having
conducted an exhaustive search for similar images has not yielded many results. It’s almost as if Nap’s creatures must have gone into hiding over the years, perhaps somewhere in the alternate universe he created for them. We did manage to find an image of Picture Postcard No. 1 in the Microbe Series showing another of Nap’s imaginary beings, and signed by the artist. This striking image of an oversized “walrus-like” creature, who appears to be rather discombobulated as he emerges from the murky depths, (possibly by whatever has caught his golden-eyed gaze), has clear similarities to the featured painting.

Interestingly, there is a painting by Nap [unrelated to the microbe series] housed in the V&A museum, titled by the artist: First Tenor. A Grey Horse, by Tom Bowling – Sally in Our Alley. The subject of this caricature is British singer Sims [John] Reeves, an exceptional operatic tenor who studied his craft in Milan for two years. Having performed privately for Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, Reeves became renowned for his superb performances of well-known ballads, especially “Tom Bowling” [a patriotic sea shanty composed by British songwriter Charles Dibdin] and “Sally in the Alley”, a love song and ode to the aforementioned Sally, [originally a poem by Henry Carey], hence the complex title of the painting.

If you are as intrigued by these creatures as we are, or have further details to share, please don’t hesitate to contact us on 0114 2796959 or email us at info@ewbauctions.com.

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