1832
From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum
John Sheepshanks : Sketch of Hands is a 1832 by William Mulready, a Romanticism work, held at Victoria and Albert Museum.
This sketch shows two hands clasped together, drawn in quick, dark lines on light paper. The fingers twist slightly, and the lines overlap in places, making some spots look shadowy. The paper has a worn, yellowish edge, like it’s been handled a lot. The artist used a lot of tiny parallel lines to build up the shading—this is called cross-hatching. It’s a way to add depth without big blocks of color. Check out cross-hatching to see how artists create texture with just lines.
A sepia drawing from 1832 focuses on the hands of John Sheepshanks, shown holding the top edge of a sheet of paper. The work is a close-up study, capturing only the hands in detail.
Read the full account in the museum source.
William Mulready was an Irish genre painter living in London. He is best known for his romanticising depictions of rural scenes, and for creating Mulready stationery letter sheets, issued at the same time as the Penny Black postage stamp.
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