Prize Cow and Calf
William Henry Davis (c.1786 - 1865)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1856 (signed and dated)
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
515 x 670 mm
Order this imageCollection
Attingham Park, Shropshire
NT 609118
Caption
The 5th Lord Berwick chose to live at Cronkhill, an Italianate villa on the Attingham Estate. He modernised agriculture by creating a model farm and bred his prize herd of Hereford cattle. There are 17 cattle paintings in the collection, all with elaborate gilded frames.
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, Prize Cow and Calf, by William Henry Davis (c.1786 – 1865), signed and dated bottom right: W H Davis 1856. Portrait of a prize cow, brown with white markings in profile to the right facing her calf. In landscape setting, distant hill (the Wrekin) on the right. One of a set of sixteen portraits by William Henry Davis of Hereford cattle reared at Cronkhill by Richard Noel-Hill, 5th Baron Berwick (1800-1861).
Provenance
Bequeathed to the National Trust in 1947 with the estate, house and contents of Attingham by Thomas Henry Noel-Hill, 8th Baron Berwick (1877-1947) on 15th May 1953.
Credit line
Attingham Park, The Berwick Collection (National Trust)
Marks and inscriptions
Signed and dated bottom right: W H Davis 1856
Makers and roles
William Henry Davis (c.1786 - 1865), artist
References
Laing 2009: Alastair Laing, "A Bovine Paucity and Lack of Esteem", National Trust Arts/Buildings/Collections Bulletin, Summer Issue, July 2009, p.3