The art of royal life at Kew

Joanne Yeomans explores how Kew has inspired people including royalty throughout its history and introduces a new exhibition at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art which celebrates this.

Kew Palace

The ‘Inspiring Kew’ exhibition at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art (2016) explores how Kew has inspired artists, writers and scientists from its early days as a royal residence through to work that is produced today.

On display is a drawing by Princess Charlotte, the eldest daughter of George III and Queen Charlotte, which she completed at Kew in 1789 under the tutelage of botanical art master, Franz Bauer.

Born in 1766, Princess Charlotte was the eldest daughter of George III’s fifteen children, and during her early childhood Charlotte and her sisters lived at Richmond Lodge and came to Kew for lessons from their governess. The Dowager Princess of Wales, Princess Augusta, lived at the ‘Dutch House’, what is now called Kew Palace, and after her death in 1775 royal life began to centre around Kew and Windsor as George III dispensed with formality and was keen to separate court and family life.

Daily walks within Kew were obligatory for Princess Charlotte and her siblings, discovering features created by architect William Chambers and the menagerie of animals introduced by their grandmother. Kew became a royal campus and the princesses’ time here with the people they met encouraged their botanical pursuits for many years to come.

The education that Princess Charlotte and her sisters received consisted of the very best tutors and they were taught in foreign languages, history, geography, music, art and embroidery. Their father, George III, had received lessons from architect William Chambers as a child and his daughters were also taught by some of the greatest artists in the country at the time. Franz Bauer arrived in England in 1788 and Sir Joseph Banks employed him as ‘Botanick Painter to the King’ and he gave drawing lessons to the princesses which included colouring Bauer’s ‘Erica’ engravings. The Queen and the princesses were also tutored by artists Benjamin West, Mrs Delany, Margaret Meen and Mary Moser, one of the two founding female members of the Royal Academy, as well as having access to the King’s libraries which contained works by artists such as Leonardo Da Vinci. Princess Charlotte made copies of Benjamin West’s ‘The Five Senses’, which were made for her specific use, along with etching a copy of Thomas Gainsborough’s original painting of her brother Prince Octavius. Thomas Gainsborough and other successful artists of the day, Allan Ramsay, Johan Zoffany and John Singleton Copley regularly painted the Royal family.

It wasn’t just botanical painting that interested the Queen and the princesses but they also began receiving lectures on zoology and botany from the President of the newly formed Linnaean Society, Sir James Edward Smith. The Royal family began collecting specimens themselves and Lord Bute encouraged the Queen and Princess Charlotte to press their own plants and begin their own botanical collections from the plants at Kew in the grounds of Windsor Castle. In 1792 it was at Frogmore House at Windsor where the Queen and her daughters liked to ‘botanise’ and that artist Mary Moser was commissioned by Queen Charlotte to paint the ceilings and walls using the Queen’s living collections as inspiration, along with designing the embroidery for the Queen’s new bed at Windsor.

Later when Queen Charlotte’s Cottage at Kew was being remodelled in the early 1800s, Mary Moser, along with Princess Elizabeth, painted the interior on which William Hogarth prints were hung.

The education that George III and Queen Charlotte provided their daughters obviously piqued their interest in the subject of botany and botanical drawing. This was no doubt developed by the tutors they had and the acquaintances they kept due to their position. The princesses’ parents clearly encouraged this interest, as George III was very interested in art in England at this time, helping to set up the Royal Academy of Arts in 1768 and Queen Charlotte very much shared their interests in botany. Of course we’d also like to think that it was their years living at Kew which inspired the princesses.

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