When Bonington was 15 years old his family emigrated to Calais, where the young artist perfected his watercolor style under Louis Francia, a follower of the English topographical school. In 1818 Bonington moved to Paris and in 1820 he entered the studio of Gros. The paintings and watercolors which he and other English artists exhibited at the Salons of 1822 and 1824 had a marked influence on the development of this medium in France, as well as on the later “Romantic” landscape painters. Bonington’s work excercised a particular hold on Eugène Delacroix, with whom he travelled to England in 1825, and he in turn was influenced by his French friend. A change in his style, noticeable after a visit to Venice, was brought about by admiration of the old Venetian masters. Bonington’s untimely death in 1828 cut short a promising career.

Bonington was just one of many artists to mine the rich vein of inspiration provided by Quentin Durward, the popular historical novel by Walter Scott published in 1823. The small, lively watercolor exhibited here depicts the moment when Quentin Durward, a young Scottish adventurer, finds himself the unwitting focus of a disturbance in the Flemish town of Liège. In the story, which is set in the second half of the fifteenth century, Durward had been ordered by king Louis XI to conduct the countesses of Croye to the castle of the bishop of Liège. His mission completed, he went for a stroll in the town, but as he wandered through the bustling, narrow streets he suddenly found himself surrounded by a mob. He tried to fight his way free, not realizing that he was the cause of all the trouble. Durward is shown in full armor, but instead of a helmet (which he had lost in a skirmish) he is wearing the blue bonnet of Louis’ Scots bodyguard. The Liègeois mistake him for an emissary of the king, and press around him demanding to hear the latest dispatches.

The incident depicted by Bonington occurs in Chapter 19 of Scott’s novel. Two Liège burgomasters, Pavillon and Rouslaer (the latter “a corpulent dignitary, whose fair round belly, like a battering-ram, ‘did shake the press before him’”) take the bewildered Durward by the arms. He is surrounded on all sides. “Before him Nikkel Blok, the chief of the butchers’ incorporation, hastily summoned frm his office in the shambles, brandished his death-doing axe, yet smeared with blood and brains, with a courage and grace which brantwein alone could inspire. Behind him came the tall, lean, raw-boned, very drunk and very patriotic figure of Claus Hammerlein, president of the mystery of the workers in iron, and followed by at least a thousand unwashed artisans of his class.” Bonington has not succeeded entirely in conveying the press and urgency of the crowd. In fact the overall impression of the scene which he has composed around the hapless Durward is rather unconvincing. The various personalities, though, are easily recognizable: the corpulent Rouslaer, Blok, Hammerlein, and the smartly-dressed Pavillon (“a jolly, stout-made, respectable man [with a] velvet cloak and gold chain”). The dog is Bonington’s own contribution to the proceedings.

The décor of the scene follows one of Bonington’s set programs. The compositional arrangement of a view through a narrow street can also be found in his print, Rue du Gros-Horloge, Rouen of 1824. The Gothic façade rising behind Durward reflects the artist’s preoccupation with medieval architecture.

The watercolor was executed in the light, gay style which is so characteristic of Bonington, who studied under Louis Francia at Calais afer arriving in France at the age of fifteen. Although English by birth, he has been included in the catalogue because it was France, rather than England, that provided him with his formative influences as an artist. From Calais he went to Paris, where he studied for a while at the studio of Gros. His watercolors attracted attention at the Salon of 1822, and in 1825 he travelled to England with his friend Delacroix. From 25 August 1825 to 26 January 1826 the two artists shared a studio in Paris.

Cooper has associated Bonington’s scenes from Quentin Duward with his English trip, and with the period when he was working with Delacroix. Cooper’s main object was to date a painting by Bonington, now in Nottingham, which shows a variant of the scene in this watercolor. He considered it to be one of the artist’s most ambitious figure pieces, and, in his exploration of its provenance and iconography, listed all the references he could find to Bonington’s illustrations of Quentin Durward. Unfortunately, he was unaware of the existence of this dated watercolor in the Amsterdam Museum and he missed also a number of entries in auction catalogues. Cooper’s conclusion, based on stylistic and iconographic evidence, was that the painting had been executed in 1825, after Bonington had returned from England. A connection has also been postulated between the prominence given to Durward’s suit of armor and the studies which Bonington made in London from a collection of old armor belonging to Dr. Samuel Meyrick. Delacroix, too, remarked on Bonington’s interest in historical costume, which is seen to good effect in the Fodor sheet. In 1861, he wrote: “he used to choose subjects in which costume played an important part. This was around 1824 or 1825.” Another of Cooper’s arguments for his dating was the dramatic composition of the scene, in which he detected the influence of Delacroix.

Although the painting and the watercolor are very similar in their general arrangement they are by no means identical. The drawing was executed in Bonington’s distinctively light palette, while one of the most striking features of the larger canvas is the Veronese-like use of color. There are also differences in the positioning, dress and facial expressions of some of the characters. The fussy ornateness of the gothic architecture is missing in the Nottingham painting, which owes at least part of its dramatic impact to the more solid backdrop. Although this situation might indicate that the watercolor was made first and that the painting was an “improved” version, it is equally possible that the watercolor was executed as a work of art in its own right.

One notable difference between the two versions concerns Quentin Durward’s headgear – the key element in the entire episode. In the painting it is clearly made of a stiff or solid material with a light blue sheen, whereas in the watercolor it is a bright blue cap. At the beginning of the novel, Scott stated that durward’s “smart blue bonnet, with a single sprig of holly and an eagle’s feather”, was already recognized as a standard feature of Scottish dress. Later he said that one of the badges of Louis’ Scottish bodyguard was a steel-lined bonnet. Bonington seems to have had some difficulty in deciding which kind of headgear to depict.

The vague description in auction catalogues of the various watercolor illustrations of Quentin Durward make it impossible to establish the full provenance of the Fodor sheet. In 1837 a “dessin colorie” entitled Quentin Durward a Liège received fulsome praise in the catalogue of a Paris sale: “Everything in this work is of the utmost beauty, the countenances of the figures are extremely varies, as are their personalities, which are full of feeling and expression…. All is admirably conceived the play of light and shade, the bright, lively colors, and the handling of the chiaroscuro.” Cooper suggested that this sheet might have been identical to the drawing that changed hands at the Demidoff sale in 1863. Whatever the truth of the matter, it seems reasonable to assume that the drawing sold in 1837 was the one eventually acquired by Fodor. Mention should also be made of a sheet entitled Scene from Quentin Durward and described as “the property of a distinguished collector,” which was sold at Sotheby’s in 1834.

The reverse of the Fodor sheet bears the mark of Berville, a Paris collector, so it seems that it was also in his possession at some stage in its wanderings. All that is known for certain is that Fodor bought the watercolor at Ghent in 1856 for 330 guilders.