 |
|
| The Rayners: Intro // Ann Frances Louise Margaret Nancy Richard Rose Samuel // Known Paintings Sources |
| Regional pages on Louise: Chester Dudley Flint Northern England Eastern England London and the South East |
|
West of the Cross, we go into Watergate Street, and in Louise Rayner's picture below we're looking westwards along Watergate Row North. As can be seen, the Rows provide a second business level, either for the same business at | ||
 |
street level or for a totally
different enterprise. Modern shopping malls are not quite as innovative as they sometimes seem to be! Some buildings here were rebuilt in the 1970s/80s, but preserved the line of the mediaeval Row. | |
 If we look across to the
south side of Watergate Street, just past the nearest column in the painting above, we can see the peaked roof of God's
Providence House. This view shows the house after its rebuild in 1862, and by doing so dates that painting 1862 or
later. But Louise also painted it in its earlier form as we see at right, in her painting entitled God's
Providence House, Watergate Street. [Both Grosvenor and in Picturesque
Chester. Not known if prints are available.]
|
One of the pleasures of Louise Rayner's paintings is the way you find pictures within a picture, such as this detail
above left from South Side of Watergate Street - shoppers' animated conversation by the stalls, a
donkey loaded with produce, baskets in the gutter, a young girl surveying the scene while behind her a boy sits half-
hidden on the steps up to the Row. Above them, the crowd of onlookers with two gossiping women at right. And the tatty,
neglected air of the buildings: crumbling plaster, battered wood, damage to the Row's railing. Normal daily life in
microcosm.
|
Above, in Watergate Street, Chester, we see the complete picture, looking back the way we've come - back up most of Watergate Street, over the Cross
into Eastgate Street, and in the distance East Gate itself. The black house to the right is Bishop Lloyd's Palace, with
its very detailed carvings of scenes from the Bible, the 3-legged symbol of the Isle of Man, and more. Louise reproduced
this detail to considerable effect, and put similar effort into the roof line, as can be seen in the second close-up
view below. 
|
 |
| This second view of Watergate Street looking East - from a print that passed through the hands of antiquemaps.com in 2005 - is similar to the one earlier, in that the buildings seem little changed. That said, the clothes have a more modern feel to them, the long wheelbarrow at right with two small children riding in it is a very nice touch, and we see a new and interesting section of Watergate Row South just beside them. Because the street is quieter, we see more of the street level buildings, and because the picture is lighter, we see more detail. And at this point we are reminded of Peter Boughton's remarks noted earlier: the shadows are long enough for early morning, but they seem to fall from due north! |
 Louise first(?) sketched the palace in the 1860s, and the enlargement above from her sketchbook provides a closeup of her careful work on the decorative detail. 
At left is the same sketch showing the full height of the building, and at a guess, she would have been standing
or sitting at the end of Watergate Row North, pictured earlier, when she made her record. Already, her figures have
the informality of everyday poses that so characterise her paintings. This sketch also includes a detail that
we haven't seen in any of her paintings of the building - the name of the street level business, which is just
readable in the sketch as Ayrton and Groome. At right,
we have Watergate Street and Holy Trinity Church. Watergate Street is now noticeably
starting to drop away towards the river, but has not yet run out of buildings. Just ahead to the right is Trinity
Street, and immediately beyond it is Holy Trinity Church. We cannot see much of the church, but the spire was possibly
brand-new when Louise did her painting. Until the 1860s, the church had had a square tower, but this was strengthened in
the course of a general rebuild, and the new spire erected upon it. So the painting cannot be earlier than 1869. In the
distance, just over the carters' heads we get a glimpse of what might be the Watergate itself, rebuilt in much the
same way as Eastgate, and less than a decade afterwards.[Grosvenor Museum collection, larger view included in Picturesque Chester, not known if a print is available.] |
 Moving westwards past Holy Trinity, we cross a road into what is sometimes referred to as Lower Watergate Street. Here we find Stanley Palace, also on our right, which was built c.1583-97 for Sir Peter Warburton, a local lawyer and Member of Parliament. On his death in 1621 the house passed to his daughter Elizabeth who was married to Sir Thomas Stanley and he gave his name to the house. It became the town house of James Stanley, the 7th Earl of Derby, whose opinions remained openly Royalist after the English Civil War was lost and led to his execution for treason in 1651. From about 1770 the house was entered from a courtyard surrounded by cottages on the other side. It gradually fell into disrepair and was itself converted into cottages. In 1866 the building nearly went to America but was saved by a Chester historical society for preservation, and it was probably at this time that Louise painted it, giving it the title Stanley Palace or Derby House (she did more than one). For a period in the 19th century the building was indeed known as Derby House, but the earlier name was later reapplied, probably by the preserving body. The house eventually came to Chester Corporation and needed a lot of work in restoration, and its frontage was extended. But enough original parts remain for it to be alleged to be the most haunted house in Chester and there are regular night tours for those who want them. |
|
|
|
Many of the Chester images appear with the co-operation and courtesy of the Grosvenor Museum, Chester.
|
| Dudley Mall pages about Louise: | |
| Louise Rayner | - the main biography and a list of her earlier paintings |
| Louise at Chester | - where Louise made her home and did some of her best work. |
| Louise at Dudley | - front page introduction |
| Louise at Flint | - the images for Henry Taylor's book. |
| Louise in Northern England | - York... Selby... and hopefully more |
| Louise in Eastern England | - Lincoln... Derby... Cambridge |
| Louise in London and the South East | - London... Tunbridge Wells... Hastings |
| Louise in Wales and the west Midlands | - Conway... Ludlow... Gloucester |
| Louise in the South and South West | - Oxford... Chippenham... Salisbury |
| Louise in Scotland | - Edinburgh |
| Louise in Southern Scotland | - Roslin (we have no other Scottish paintings at present) |
| Louise Abroad | - Rheims... Venice... and possibly Bruges |
| In preparation: | - The Rayners at Windsor |
|
Please take note: we claim no art expertise, and in no way do we offer provenance for any paintings. What you see here was compiled out of interest in Louise Rayner's paintings and those by her family, but is based on sometimes very fragmentary evidence. As such, it is inevitable that there will be errors, though we naturally hope to reduce these over time. We would gratefully receive any information or corrections that will help us to fill the gaps and resolve unproved links - for example confirmation of dates of birth, death, etc., and details of other addresses the family lived at (and roughly when). Images of any of the family's paintings would also be very welcome. Thank you! |
 |
|
