Artists
Collection of letters by artists, mainly British and French, 1816-1923
Altogether 12 items. Provenance: Sotheby's, 22 & 23 July 1982, lot 506.

Letters by artists including Ruskin, Whistler, Lucien Pissarro and others.

The letters include:
John Ruskin, two letters, the first 19 September 1869, 'I have been doing some work in Italy which may interest you', the second 19 June 1882, 'My illnesses are only of brain – and leave the body much as it was before. I should be greatly ashamed of myself if I could not climb – either your stairs – or Strasburg steeple – nearly as fast as I used to'; with a signed receipt, 1869, and a printed catalogue for the sale of 11 Turner watercolours from Ruskin's collection at Christie's, 1882
James McNeill Whistler, [1896], a letter of condolence
Lucien Pissarro, 17 February 1923, to the art critic [Frank] Rutter, 'I can't help feeling very shy of the important place you give me in your book. Do you really believe in progress in art?', comparing his work with that of his father, and the relationship of Cézanne, Van Gogh and Gauguin to the Impressionists, 4 pages
Benjamin Robert Haydon, 1842, proposing three lectures, on Fuzeli, the Elgin Marbles and fresco painting

also Sir Thomas Lawrence (1828), Coventry Patmore (1896), John Everett Millais (signature only) and others.