Botanical Watercolour on Vellum by MATILDA CONYERS (1697 – 1793) ~ Signed and Dated, 1767

Matilda CONYERS (born c. 1697)

Phaseolus, the Scarlet Bean

Watercolor and opaque watercolor over graphite, on vellum parchment.

Three generations of women from the Conyers family were highly accomplished botanical painters over the course of the eighteenth century.

The first was Matilda Fermor (born c. 1697), daughter of Lord Lempster, who married Edward Conyers around 1715. Their son, John Conyers (1717–1775), married his first cousin, Henrietta Fermor (1727–1793) — Matilda’s niece by birth and, through this marriage, her daughter-in-law as well. John and Henrietta’s daughter, Matilda Conyers II (1753–1803), granddaughter of the elder Matilda, was likewise celebrated for her botanical watercolours. A fourth painter in the family was Sophia Conyers, daughter of Matilda I and sister-in-law of Henrietta, who married Sir Roger Newdigate (1719–1806), the Grand Tourist and founder of the Newdigate Prize.

The present work — a signed and dated depiction of Phaseolus, the Scarlet Bean — is a beautifully composed botanical illustration by the first and rarest of the three Conyers painters who was born at the end of the 17th century.  It is executed in watercolor and opaque watercolor over traces of graphite, with inscriptions in brown ink, on vellum — “a medium particularly favored by botanical artists for its smooth and even texture: a surface which allowed for the details of plants, flowers and foliage to be accurately depicted.”

The vellum is a little buckled along the edge; otherwise the sheet is in fine, fresh condition, white and bright with a translucent quality, the colors especially strong and vibrant.

The Conyers family lived at Copped Hall in Essex, celebrated for its splendid gardens, and certainly owned works by the greatest botanical artist of the period, Georg Dionysius Ehret (1708–1770), who specialized in instructing pupils from English upper-class families. It is very likely that these ladies took lessons from him directly. Until recently, her work apparently remained unknown outside the family circle.

A rare opportunity to acquire a work of great skill and charm by a virtually unrecorded eighteenth-century female botanical artist.

Flower painting was considered an appropriate pastime for aristocratic women in the eighteenth century. Members of the Conyers family, which included a number of women who were accomplished botanical artists, may have taken lessons from Georg Ehret, whose work is on view nearby. This drawing reveals an understanding of the Linnaean system of classification, showing all parts of the flower to aid in identification. Conyers records the wallflower with open petals and in bud form. Her skill in describing plants is revealed in the delicate rendering of the tulip’s variegated petals, one of which curls upward slightly as it falls away from the rest of the flower

– Description of the three Botanical works by Matilda Conyers in the The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens.  These were included in the exhibition: “In Pursuit of Flora: 18th-Century Botanical Drawings from the Huntington’s Art Collections”.  

The Huntington and The Morgan Library are the only museums  in the US where we could locate Botanical illustrations by the first Mathilda Conyers.  Interestingly, both the Morgan and the Huntington’s watercolors were created in the very same year of 1767, part of the same series and with the same dimensions 9 x 6 1/4 inches (235 x 160 mm) as our work. 

See K. Sloan, ‘A Noble Art’, BM exh. cat., 2000, no. 166 (text below):

….Most commonly in the eighteenth century, the women of the family painted their own in watercolour, carefully labelling the plants by the Linnean system and showing leaf, stem, petals, flowers and their parts, with seeds. Similar albums to Lady Aylesford’s were produced by several generations of Conyers women at Copt Hall in Essex. Most of Matilda Conyers’ (1753-1803) watercolours were painted on vellum, and the album containing watercolours by an older Matilda (d. 1793) and Henrietta (1727-93) included drawings by Ehret who clearly influenced their work, if they did not actually receive lessons from him.

Literature: Matilda and Henrietta Conyers at Abbott and Holder, June 1996 ( from whom this work was acquired in 1996)

Thomas Williams Fine Art, A Georgian Garden: Botanical Studies …by Matilda Conyers (d. 1803), exh. and sale, N.Y., 1997;John Ingamells, Dictionary of British and Irish Travellers to Italy, pp. 704-5.