Deutscher and Hackett

At sixteen years of age, Conrad Martens, following in the path of his elder brothers Henry and John, began his artistic studies under the landscape watercolourist Copley Fielding (1787 – 1855).  However, it wasn’t until he left England in 1832, joining the well-worn path of other young English and European artists who travelled the world, that his notable journey began as he embarked on an extended trip to the East Indies. Upon arriving in Rio de Janeiro in 1833, Martens’ plans unexpectedly changed, and he left the Hyacinth, later transferring to the HMS Beagle under Captain Robert FitzRoy where he replaced the ill Augustus Earle as the ship’s artist. Here, Martens worked alongside a young Charles Darwin whose scientific studies and naturalist observations deeply influenced Martens’ artistic practice. Martens’ invaluable time on HMS Beagle formed the platform for his mature artistic style, wherein he married his technical artistic skills with a more empirical approach. 
 
In 1835, Conrad Martens arrived in Sydney, delighting in the various aspects and vantage points of the Sydney Harbour. He established a studio in Pitt street and in a short time, his work found favour with the wealthy elites anxious to display their newfound status. Sydney Harbour with its steep and verdant native undergrowth slopping down to a glistening sea offered endless opportunities, both intimate and panoramic, to depict picturesque scenes and the colony’s newfound prosperity.  Most of Martens’ watercolours and oils were commissions incorporating not only expansive harbour views, but also the Illawarra and Blue Mountains.
 
In Elizabeth Bay, Sydney, c.1840 we see an idyllic and genial domestic scene. A woman seated on rocky platform, watching a child who appears to be pointing to a nearby fisherman casting a line from a small vessel nearby. The figures enveloped by a ragged shoreline with Elizabeth Bay House in the distance are set against a foreboding dark sky.  Throughout his career, Martens’ watercolours celebrated topographical accuracy over imagination, and his skill was to incorporate minute details within often expansive Claudian-influenced panoramas within the observed landscape, native flora and climatic conditions.