MARK MITCHELL Paintings & Drawings is a trading division of his father’s company, Paul Mitchell Ltd Art Dealers London, Specialists in Antique & Reproduction Picture Frames and Conservation & Restoration of Paintings.
Having explored the art market over several years, Mark is fulfilling his ambition to expand the picture-dealing side of his father’s business and is becoming one of the most respected art dealers London. He has assembled a rich and varied collection of works: it comprises both British pictures and European paintings, from the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, as well as contemporary works. It includes landscape oil paintings, seascapes, figure paintings, interiors and Still Life Paintings in different media: oil paintings, watercolours and drawings.
Mark is one of the third generation of the Mitchell family of fine art dealers London, founded by his grandfather John Mitchell in 1930, whose Bond Street gallery is run by Mark’s uncle Peter and cousins James and William.
The guiding principle of the COLLECTION is to bring back into the spotlight some of the talented and highly-trained artists who so often have been overshadowed by their more fashionable contemporaries. Consequently many of these painters are relatively rarely seen for sale in the art market, although careful research reveals how esteemed they once were.
The artists in the collection range from the 17th century painter of ‘gamepieces’, William Gowe Ferguson, to Stephen Rose (b. 1960), who produces still life paintings, landscape oil paintings, nudes and portrait paintings. Nearly all of them were trained in the major art schools (the Slade, the Byam Shaw School of Art, the Royal Academy Schools, the Munich Academy, the Dublin School of Art, the British School in Rome, the Danish Royal Academy), have exhibited in the main institutions and have work in public collections worldwide.
For example, amongst the artists of still life paintings, William Gowe Ferguson has pictures in the Louvre, the Tate, the Musée des Arts décoratifs de Bordeaux and the Manchester City Art Gallery, and Charles Thomas Bale, Stephen Rose and Duncan Oppenheim all exhibited in the Royal Academy.
Of the landscapists, Joseph Henderson exhibited in the Royal Scottish Academy from the age of 25, in the Royal Academy from 1871-86, and in the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colour, becoming a member in 1906; Frederick R. Lee exhibited in the Royal Academy for 46 years. Edward Wesson, who is noted for both seascapes and landscape oil paintings, exhibited in the Royal Society of British Artists, the Royal Academy, the Royal Institute of Painters in Oil, the Royal Society of Marine Painters, and the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colour (of which he was a member).
Albert Ludovici junr. served on the committee of the Society of British Artists when Whistler was President (ditto the International Society), as well as exhibiting in the New English Art Club, the New Watercolour Society, the Royal Society of British Artists and the Grosvenor Gallery.
These are all extremely skilful and versatile artists, who have failed to gain a lasting grip on public attention – perhaps through the competitiveness of the art market, through a lack of vision in their past dealers, or through too little public exposure. So you can find them here – talented painters from the last four-&-a-half centuries, creating beautiful and decorative works of art for any interior, and mostly quite rare as they are not often for sale.