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Famous 18th-Century painting to remain in hometown

Lisa YoungCornwall
News imagePenlee House A section of the oil painting depicting fishermen and their families at the turn of the century. There is a woman sat on a step holding a young child and a man is sat talking to her as another woman walks by.Penlee House
Walter Langley painted Cornish Fisherfolk in 1908

An 18th Century oil painting is to go on permanent display one mile (1.6 km) from where it was first painted nearly 120 years ago.

Walter Langley, founder of the Newlyn School of artists, painted Cornish Fisherfolk in 1908. The artwork, formerly owned by Waverley Borough Council, has been on loan to Penlee House for the past 14 years.

Chiefs at Penlee House in Penzance have since raised £65,000 to buy the painting.

Katie Herbert, Penlee House curator, said it had the second-most important collection of Langley's work, after Birmingham Museums Trust and it was "fitting" that his work be well-represented at the gallery.

News imagePenlee House An oil painting depicting fishermen and their families at the turn of the century. There is a woman sat on a step holding a young child and a man is sat talking to her as another woman walks by. At the top of the steps is a house with a stable door half open with a woman looking out of it. Beyond there is a green hill and blue sky.Penlee House
Herbert said Langley's upbringing led him to depict scenes of hardship in Newlyn

Investigations discovered the painting was sold in 1910 for £100 and after the owner died, it was given to a second owner who bequeathed it to Godalming Parish Council, a forerunner of Waverley Borough Council in 1920.

In July, council leaders offered Penlee Gallery the opportunity to buy the painting.

Herbert said: "We are grateful to Waverley Borough Council for their considered decision to offer the painting through a private treaty sale, rather than releasing it to the uncertainties of auction."

She explained it was because Langley had come from a poor, working-class background in Birmingham that he had been drawn to depicting the common hardships and tragedies that took place in Newlyn.

The name Newlyn School was used to describe a colony of artists based in or near the harbour village from the 1880s until the early 20th Century.

The gallery bought the painting with support from the Arts Council England, the Victoria & Albert Museum Purchase Grant Fund, Art Fund and The Friends of Penlee House.

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