Oil paint on canvas
Tate Britain
Tate Collection
Works with images
Works on display
General Collection
Art Fund
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/william-stott-of-oldham-533" aria-label="More by William Stott of Oldham" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">William Stott of Oldham</a>
Prince or Shepherd Prince ou Berger
Presented by R. Temperley through the Art Fund 1939
architecture
bridge
bridges and viaducts
children
countries and continents
fence
field
flower
France
girl
landscape
people
places
plants and flowers
townscapes / man-made features
wooded
<p>William Stott studied in Paris under the French painter, Jean-Léon Gérôme. He also exhibited at the Paris Salon, where he was awarded a medal in 1882. This picture is an exercise in the type of rural naturalism practised by French artists like Jules Bastien-Lepage, who were in turn influenced by the group of painters working in the Cornish fishing village of Newlyn in England. Stott devotes considerable attention to the arrangement of the closely observed flowers and vegetation. This kind of detail appealed to more conservative elements of the British art world, such as the Royal Academy, where Stott frequently exhibited.</p><p><em>Gallery label, August 2004</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
6 December 2003 – 24 April 2004
2004-04-24
6 December 2003 – 24 April 2004
2004-04-24
2003-12-06
Gallery Oldham (Oldham, UK)
http://www.galleryoldham.org.uk
2003-12-06
William Stott of Oldham
Loan-out
5 November 2012 – 20 July 2014
2014-07-20
5 November 2012 – 20 July 2014
2014-07-20
2012-11-05
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2012-11-05
Gallery 9
Collection based display
1 May 2017 – 4 February 2018
2018-02-04
1 May 2017 – 28 January 2018
2018-01-28
2017-05-01
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2017-05-01
William Stott of Oldham
Collection based display
24 February 2018 – 31 March 2020
2020-03-31
24 February 2018 – 2 September 2018
2018-09-02
2018-02-24
Oriel y Parc Gallery and Visitor Centre (St Davids, UK)
2018-02-24
Stott Tour
Loan-out
14 September 2018 – 12 January 2019
2019-01-12
14 September 2018 – 12 January 2019
2019-01-12
2018-09-14
Southampton City Art Gallery (Southampton, UK)
http://www.southampton.gov.uk/leisure/arts
2018-09-14
Stott Tour
Loan-out
14 January 2019 – 16 June 2019
2019-06-16
14 January 2019 – 16 June 2019
2019-06-16
2019-01-14
Gallery Oldham (Oldham, UK)
http://www.galleryoldham.org.uk
2019-01-14
Stott Tour
Loan-out
2 November 2019 – 8 March 2020
2020-03-08
2 November 2019 – 8 March 2020
2020-03-08
2019-11-02
Aberdeen Art Gallery (Aberdeen, UK)
http://www.aagm.co.uk
2019-11-02
Stott Tour
Loan-out
31 October 2022
4 October 2021
2021-10-04
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2022-10-31
Gallery 8
Collection based display
Prince or Shepherd? (Prince ou Berger?)
support: 718 × 578 mm
frame: 905 × 768 × 62 mm
Presented by R. Temperley through the <a href="/search?gid=999999968" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Art Fund</a> 1939
<div class="text">
<p>William Stott was a leading figure among the group of British artists influenced by French naturalism in the closing decades of the nineteenth century. After Manchester School of Art he trained in Paris and exhibited several works at the Paris Salon. He painted this picture in the summer of 1880 during his first visit to Grez-sur-Loing, a picturesque village on the edge of the forest of Fontainebleau some fifty miles south-east of Paris. Since the mid-1870s Grez had become home to an international colony of artists that included the American John Singer Sargent, the Scot Arthur Melville and the Irish painter Frank O’Meara, all of whom Stott was on close terms with during his time in France. Like the other paintings Stott produced in Grez that year (<i>La Tricoteuse</i> and <i>Une Rêve de Midi</i>, both private collection), <i>Prince or Shepherd?</i> shows a young woman deep in contemplation. The twelfth-century stone bridge that appears in many paintings produced at Grez can be seen in the distance.</p>
<p>In style and subject matter Stott’s picture shows the influence of the French <i>plein air</i> (open air) painter Jules Bastien-Lepage, whose work was much admired by British naturalists for its broad brushwork and strong sentiment. However, as the art historian Roger Brown observed in 2003, Stott’s work is more poetic and enigmatic in approach. The title of his painting alludes to the day-dream of the girl and her thoughts about her future: will she marry a rich man and escape the village or will she remain a country girl? While enclosed in by the fences and foliage in the foreground, the broken fence upon which the girl leans also doubles up as a symbolic threshold onto an uncertain future, enhancing the meditative mood of the scene. Stott was to develop this theme in his more ambitious <i>Le Passeur</i> (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/stott-of-oldham-le-passeur-the-ferryman-t14872" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>T14872</span></a>) of the following year which features possibly the same girl, now a year older. The motif of a girl in blue leaning wistfully on a gate or fence was to become highly influential; it appears, for instance, in George Clausen’s <i>The</i> <i>Girl at a Gate</i> 1889 (Tate <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/clausen-the-girl-at-the-gate-n01612" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N01612</span></a>) and John Lavery’s <i>Under the Cherry Tree</i> 1884 (Ulster Museum).</p>
<p>
<i>La Tricoteuse</i> and <i>Une Rêve de Midi</i> were both exhibited at the Paris Salon in 1881, while <i>Prince or Shepherd?</i> was shown that same year in London at the Grosvenor Gallery. Thereafter it disappeared from public view until it was bought by Roger Temperley in 1928 from an auction in Vichy, France, and then bequeathed to the Tate Gallery in 1939. The picture’s then title <i>Girl in a Meadow</i> was adopted by the Tate until 2017 when it reverted to Stott’s original title for the picture.</p>
<p>
<b>Further reading</b>
<br/>Roger Brown, <i>William Stott of Oldham, 1857–1900, ‘A Comet Rushing to the Sun’</i>, exhibition catalogue, Oldham Art Gallery 2003, p.58, reproduced p.59.<br/>Kenneth McConkey, <i>William Stott of Oldham: Le Passeur</i>, exhibition catalogue, Fine Art Society, London 2016, pp.3–7.</p>
<p>Alison Smith<br/>May 2017</p>
</div>

Summary
2017-06-15T00:00:00
summary
SHORT_TEXT
<div class="text">
<p>William Stott studied in London and Paris and exhibited at the Paris Salon, winning a medal in 1882. This picture is an exercise in the type of rural naturalism favoured by French artists of the time. In turn, they were influenced by the group of painters working in the Cornish fishing village of Newlyn in Cornwall, England. Here, Stott pays close attention to the arrangement of the flowers and vegetation. This kind of detail appealed to more conservative elements of the art world.</p>
</div>

Online caption
2023-11-29T00:00:00
online-caption
ONLINE_CAPTION
<p><b>N05031</b> Prince or Shepherd? (Prince ou Berger?) 1880</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Inscr. ‘W. Stott. 1880.’ b.l.
<br/>Canvas, 28 1/4×22 3/4 (72×57·5).
<br/>Presented by Robert Temperley through the National Art-Collections Fund 1939.
<br/><i>Coll:</i> Purchased by the Galerie Lorenceau, Vichy, <i>c.</i> 1928 from an unidentified local furniture sale; purchased from them by Robert Temperley August 1928.</p>
<p>A MS. label on the frame written by Robert Temperley in March 1939 gives the above information about the Galerie Lorenceau, with the additional note that this gallery had no record of the picture's history previous to its purchase by them, nor of its correct title. The Galerie Lorenceau again checked its records (January 1958) and corroborated this information. The <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/canvas" title="Glossary definition for 'Canvas'"><span>canvas</span></a> bears the stencil of a French colourman, ‘Blanchet’ of Paris, and was obviously painted in France.</p>
<p><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, <i>The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture</i>, London 1964, II
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-06T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
architecture bridge bridges and viaducts children countries and continents fence field flower France girl landscape people places plants and flowers townscapes / man-made features wooded