Personal archive of local artist set to go to auction after being found
After finding the items, it became a little mission to research it all, it has been an adventure
Chris Wilson
THE fishing village of Cullercoats was a magnet for artists for decades. Its heyday as an artists’ colony stretched from 1870 to 1920, as a long line of painters depicted the fishing community and their traditional dress.
Now refurbishment work by the new owner of a house in Windsor Road in Monkseaton has revealed an array of items relating to one of the prominent Cullercoats artists, Robert Jobling.
Much of the work of Jobling and his artist wife
Isa Thompson focused on Cullercoats and Staithes in North Yorkshire, another fishing village favourite with painters.
Jobling, born in 1841 in Newcastle and who died in 1923, lived in Whitley Bay and was a regular exhibitor at the Royal Academy in London.
The Jobling finds will be sold by Newcastle auctioneers Anderson & Garland tomorrow.
It is believed that a Jobling family member was a previous occupant of the house.
New owner Chris Wilson said that the items had been found in suitcases in a desk and the attic,
“After finding the items, it became a little mission to research it all, which was exciting. It has been an adventure ,” he said.
John Anderson, picture specialist at Anderson & Garland, said:” It would be right if what has been found could be saved for the North East.”
The finds comprise the personal archive of the family of the artist which includes numerous letters, photographs, diary, items relating to the Newcastle Pen and Palette Club of which Jobling was one of the founders, original watercolours, sketches, and glass negatives depicting members of the artist’s family and his major paintings, paint-boxes and art materials.
Among Jobling paintings found at the house are King Edward’s Bay Tynemouth; A View of the Tyne from North Shields; A Winter’s Morning on the Tyne: and The Quayside,
Although many of Jobling’s works are fishing and coastal studies, in 1890 he visited Consett and produced paintings of the town’s iron works and interior views including a view of the furnace,
In his early years Jobling worked as a ship painter at the Tyne General Ferry’s yard, where he became a foreman but he left to be a full time artist.
From 1883 his studio was in Shakespeare Street in Newcastle for 11 years and he held art classes at Armstrong College.