Paul Fourdrinier after a painting by Peter Monamy (1681-1749)

Sweet William’s Farewell to Black-eyed Susan

London: circa 1730 - 1743

Hand-colored engraving

Sight size: 11 1/2 x 14 1/4"

Frame size: 20 x 22 3/4"

Peter Monamy was an English marine painter born and active in London. He began his artistic career as a decorative painter with the Worshipful Company of Painter-Stainer’s, a London painter’s guild, in 1703 following a seven year apprenticeship under the house-painter William Clarke.

Monamy developed a natural interest in painting marine and naval scenes. It was probably through his friend the artist William Hogarth that Monamy was commissioned to create at least four paintings for the Vauxhall Gardens, a resort in London, which illustrated John Gay’s patriotic naval ballad Sweet William’s Farewell to Black Eyed Susan. The paintings are now lost, but known from the engravings of the paintings by Paul Fourdrinier. This engraving shows verses 4 and 8 of the ballad.