Attributed to Thomas Wyck (Dutch 1616-1677)

Attributed to Thomas Wyck (Dutch 1616-1677)
View of the Thames at Westminster on Lord Mayor's Day
Oil on canvas
60.9 x 90.9cm; 24 x 35¾in

Provenance:
Willis Group Corporate Collection;
By whom sold, Bonhams, The Willis Associates Sale, 21 February 2008, lot 99, where purchased by the present private collector

The present work is a rare and important view of London, painted in the early 1660s, after the Restoration and before the Great Fire of 1666. Looking north across the Thames, in the distance is the Old Palace of Westminster, including St Stephen's Chapel (which served as the chamber of the House of Commons), Westminster Hall, and Westminster Abbey. On the right hand side we see the Palace of Whitehall, with the Banqueting House prominent.

The Thames itself is packed with vessels of various sizes, and the presence of numerous Livery Company barges, each with their guild banners on display, suggests that the painting depicts the Lord Mayor's Procession. This was an annual event in which the Mayor of London and the aldermen travelled by river from the City to Westminster to be sworn in and then presented to the King. In the centre of the work, firing a salute as the flotilla passes, is a royal yacht, possible the Royal Escape, which Charles II had taken passage on to escape parliamentarian forces during the Civil War.

Very few paintings of London prior to the Great Fire are known. Thomas Wyck was one of the few artists to paint such works, including a view across the Thames from Southwark (at Chatsworth House), and a view of Whitehall and St James's Park (in the Bank of England Museum). Although views of London and the Thames proliferated in the mid 18th Century, with artists such as Canaletto, the present work predates these by almost a century, and provides a fascinating and important early record of the capital.