Provenance
By descent to the artist's grandson, possibly grandnephew (taken from an inscription on the reverse).
With Manning Gallery, London.
Anon. sale, Sotheby's, London, 9 November 1995, lot 161.

This likely shows a group of contrabandista (smugglers) unpacking contraband goods from a chest. It may be related to the watercolour Spanish Contrabandista that Lewis exhibited at the Society of Painters in Water Colours in 1834 (no. 375; probably the work now in a private collection, recently exhibited at the Watts Gallery, Compton, in John Frederick Lewis: Facing Fame, 2019). The most resolved figure is a man in blue with a red cape and black pointed hat, examining one of the items. He is comparable to the similarly attired central character in the aforementioned Contrabandista watercolour.

We are grateful to Briony Llewellyn for her assistance in cataloguing this lot.

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- 19th Century & Orientalist Paintings