Australian ship oil painting by R.A.Borstel

A fine oil on canvas ship portrait by the Australian pierhead painter Reginald Arthur Borstel 1875-1922. The ship depicted has the name Chiltonford, it is beautifully painted under full sail in a choppy sea. The work is inscribed to the lower left ‘Laidlaw and Harris, 64 Union Street, Belmont, Sydney, NSW’. Laidlaw and Harris were a photography firm which commissioned artists like Borstel to paint portraits of visiting ships which could then be photographed and the photos sold to the crew. The work is signed and dated to the left ‘R.A.Borstel 1912’. Reginald Arthur Borstel 1875-1922 was one of the most famous of the Australian pierhead painters and worked between the 1890’s and 1920. The son of a master mariner John Henry Borstel, he had little formal art training before exhibiting his ship portraits in the windows of photographic studios and on-board ships. He was employed by two photographic firms to paint ship portraits that would then be photographed, these were the firm of Laidlaw and Harris and the photographer Frederick Temple West. The portraits of Borstel are highly sort after and feature in the collection of the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney. This piece is a fine and large example of the work of Borstel. The painting has had some professional repairs made to holes and is now in excellent condition. The hardwood frame is the original and probably an Australian native species, it is in excellent untouched condition with a good colour and patina. The whole has a great period decorative look and is a very interesting piece of Australian maritime history.
Overall sizes in inches including frame: 31 ½ by 21 ½