Lear’s Pictures

Lear is remembered as humorist, zoological draughtsman, poet and musician, but perhaps his greatest works are his beautifully-observed landscape drawings and watercolours. He began his career at the age of sixteen, drawing animals and birds in the London Zoo. After 1837 he made his living as a landscape painter, travelling throughout Europe and as far afield as India in search of new places to draw.

The Landscape Artist in Greece

Lear’s journey with Charles Church in 1848 was his first visit to Greece; he later settled in Corfu and travelled widely in what is now Greece: his “polygraphic Hellenic proclivities” were to produce approximately 3,000 Greek drawings.

Lear’s Method

Lear sketched swiftly on the spot, scribbling notes on his preliminary drawings and numbering them; later, indoors, he would ‘pen out’, inking over his pencil outlines and adding colour wash. The sketches could then be worked up as finished “studio” watercolours or more ambitious oil paintings, for exhibition and sale.

Pictures from the 1848 Trip

Lear’s numbered series runs from 1 to 143A, with a few unnumbered figure and flower drawings. We know the present whereabouts of only 51 of the numbered series, though others are well documented from sale and exhibition catalogues. Throughout his life Lear continued to work from his original drawings; we have identified eleven studio watercolours and three oil paintings. Oil was used for the most “famous” scenes: Marathon and Thermopylae, of which there is an example below.

The Numbered Series

Below we have drawn together the pictures from Lear’s numbered series. They are displayed in the order given by Lear, according to his running numbers, displayed above each image.

Number 4 – Athens: Hephaisteion

Number 5 – Athens

Number 6 – Athens

Number 7 – Athens, the Acropolis

Number 8 – Athens

Number 9 – Athens

Number 10 – Athens, the Hephaistion from the Acropolis

Number 12 – Athens, Temple of Minerva

Number 13 – Athens, Temple of Nike Apteros

Number 18 – Athens

Number 19 – Athens

Number 20 – Athens

Number 23 – Athens from Mount Lycabettus

Number 26 – Athens

Number 28 – Athens, Royal Palace

Number 32 – Marathon

Number 36 – Marathon

Number 43 – Vathy, near Chalcis

Number 57 – Near Kymi

Number 59 – Near Kymi

Number 61 – Vrisi on the island of Euboea

Number 62 – Mount Dirphys

Number 66 – Between Chalkis and Castella

Number 67 – Castella

Number 71 – Near Achmèt Agà

Number 72 – In the Pine Forests near Achmèt Agà

Number 78 – Near Achmèt Agà

Number 81 – Near Kokinamelia

Number 82 – Forest, Sea and Mountains, Kokinamelia

Number 84 – Stylida

Number 86B – Lamia

Number 92 – Lamia

Number 93 – Mountains of Katabothra

Number 95 – Neopatra

Number 96 – Patradgik, Mountain Village

Number 99 – Zeitum (Lamia)

Number 100 – Spercheius

Number 103 – Thermopylae Hot Springs

Number 104 – Thermopylae

Number 105 – Near Vodonitza

Number 111 – Helicon and Lake Copais from the mountains above Kokhino on the way to Thebes

Number 112 – From the mountain above Kokhino on the way to Thebes

Number 115 – Thebes and Cithaeron

Number 116 – Near Thebes

Number 117 – Thebes

Number 118 – Thebes, Thiva

Number 121 – Thebes

Number 123 – Plataea

Number 124 – Plataea, Shepherds resting on ruins

Number 127 – Athens, road to Carra

Number 131 – The Temple of Hephaestus

Number 143A – Kara