Ceylon: Esplanade and Fortification of Colombo c.1848-9

A watercolour depicting a distant view of the fort at Columbo, Sri Lanka. Signed: A Nicholl A.R.H.A. The verso is inscribed with a price and the title of the work.

Andrew Nicholl was a landscape painter and illustrator from Belfast who was appointed to teach landscape, scientific drawing and design at Colombo Academy in Ceylon (Sri Lanka) by the British Government in 1846. He was responsible for the illustrations which were reproduced as prints in Ceylon: an Account of the Island, physical, historical and topographical (1859) by Sir James Emmerson Tennent, civil secretary to the colonial government of Ceylon 1845-50.

A watercolour with the title inscribed on the back of this work was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1849 (no. 718). Queen Victoria acquired three views of Sri Lanka by him (see also RCINs 921949 and 451106).

Descriptive Medium: 'watercolour painting'