The Wanderlust Lady and the Door to Door Salesman - 28

January
29, 2013

The next day, being fine, I managed to finish off the outside windows and doors – doing the undercoat in the morning, and then by mid afternoon, that was sufficiently dry for me to put the top coat on. By bedtime they were dry enough to close. I only had the hard bits to do now, that required the ladder.

Wednesday I spent finishing off the skirting boards, and made a start on the window ledges on the inside. I again did my task of edging the windows so I didn't have to be so careful with my paint. Even so it was a pretty pokey job, compared to painting the walls. It took me until Friday to finish off the job, and by then the weather had turned again, so I knew I wouldn't be doing the rest of the outside painting in the near future.

Saturday, I decided to get down the pictures from the attic, and see what I could find out about them, so I could describe them to the Manx Museum when I wrote asking if they knew anybody who might want to buy them.

It was the first time I'd been to the attic since I came back. I always knew that it was there waiting for me to rediscover my treasure hoard – but what had seemed so easy to deal with last time, now worried my conscience a bit. Nobody knew the silver was in the trunk but me. I even wondered if Minnie had known or whether it had been there all
her life – left by her parents -and she hadn't bothered to find out.

But Minnie was dead. The silver wasn't something that I could tell her about and share the proceeds with her, like I'd imagined before. It now was legally the property of Mr and Mrs. Mills, as was everything else in the house. I'd taken the sovereigns out before they inherited them, so nobody could say I stole those from them. But the silver, and the pictures were different. The Mills might not know they exist – and therefore wouldn't be looking for them and calling in the police. I always think, what you don't know, doesn't hurt you. But I still had myself to live with. I'd lied to the police again the other day – when the cop asked if I'd taken anything else. Technically the gold was still gold – and what I'd traded the coins was still around only now it was in a different form – but still gold and still worth a lot of money. If need be, I could always give that back to the Mills.

“Enough of this talk,” I told myself. “Minnie would want you to continue our adventure. She didn't even know this remote cousin of hers. But then again,” I said to myself, “the Mills have been very fair with me – much more than I could have expected once they knew what I'd done.”

I put the hook on the trap door and pulled it down, and then pulled out the ladder and climbed once more up the stairs. It had been over five months and there was a layer of dust on everything again. I was pretty sure nobody had been up here since I was last here. I got the other pictures out of the chest of drawers and also took the empty picture frame, and brought the whole bunch downstairs.

I wondered if Mr. John Nicholson would have anything written about him at the library. Even though I don't have a card and can't use the computer there any more I could still go and look through the books. So before I did anything else, I found my old notebook and took a pen, and went to Marple Library.

There was a section on British Landscape painters – and after riffling through several I found a book with not only an entry, but some pictures by my man. I copied out the information about him.

Born 29^th January 1840 at Church Street Douglas, son of William Nicholson, house painter and decorator. He was an excellent draughtsman who spent much time sketching in pencil the people and places of the Island. According to many it was only his aversion to public acclaim and his non-commercial attitude that prevented him from ranking with
the most successful Victorian painters.

After his visit to Italy his style became much more impressionistic.

Of my four pictures, three of them are dated after his trip to Italy – so must be
considered impressionistic.

Here
are some quotes from the book.

Passing to the days of his youth, he had the good fortune to enjoy the friendship of
an invalid lady named Wilks, who lived in Marina Terrace. From her couch, where she lay helpless and seldom free from pain, she watched the ever-changing panorama of cloud and sea pictures on Douglas Bay. 

She discovered that her young friend had a talent for drawing, and gave him his
first commission to copy one of her treasured paintings.  With commendable pride and enthusiasm he set to work, and when the picture was completed it was difficult to decide which was the original painting.

From 1864 onwards into the seventies we may say were Nicholson's strenuous years, when he sought to achieve excellency in draughtsmanship. During those years he worked unceasingly, copying numberless pictures, photographs, engravings and decorative designs. He practised in many mediums connected with Art, and we must admit that his success was in no small measure due to his robust health and physical powers.

Ruskin purchased a number of them at five pounds each, and distributed them to Art Galleries to be kept in their permanent collections. Ruskin wrote to Nicholson commending him for the excellence of his work.

In the year 1877, The Grosvenor Gallery was opened to give special advantages to
artists of established reputation and to others who had been little known to the public. Nicholson generally sent his pictures to The Grosvenor, where they were hung on the line and often purchased on the day the Exhibition was opened. Occasionally he exhibited in the Liverpool and Manchester Exhibitions. 

A critic reviewing Nicholson's work, hesitatingly allowed that he was a great
artist. He said that Nicholson followed the dictates of his own genius, and through his desire to paint Nature as she really was, when pretty pictures telling a story were in vogue, he failed to obtain popularity in his own time. As to the sale of his pictures,
that was a secondary matter, and Nicholson would not alter a line to suit the fancies of a possible buyer.

There is no record extant of the number of Nicholson's paintings and drawings. He
did not keep a diary nor a list of his works.  The Manx Museum gallery of Nicholson's paintings and drawings does not represent the artist at the zenith of his power; certainly not as a painter in water-colour. His best works, which were purchased at the London and
Manchester exhibitions, cannot be traced, but there are many pictures belonging to the early period of his career in private houses (and in mine) in the Island.

Having studied my pictures carefully, I think the one I like best probably is of Castle
Rushen and certainly the colours are very vibrant in it. That is the earliest one, painted in 1876. The other three I think are all of Douglas Harbour – one with a little boat of children approaching a large sailing vessel. Two were painted in 1893 and they show the
influence of Impressionism on his work – with the sea fairly popping out in its brightness. The last of mine is from 1898, and the sea is more muted again in it.

I can't wait to hear what the Manx Museum will say when they realise they are about to be offered four more of his paintings.