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Interview of the Revd. Lewis Way, with the Emir of Mt. Lebanon

Albert Way

1823

watercolor

From the collection of Victoria and Albert Museum

Romanticism Early 19th Century Interior

Dominant colour

Interview of the Revd. Lewis Way, with the Emir of Mt. Lebanon is a 1823 watercolor by Albert Way, a Romanticism work, held at Victoria and Albert Museum.

Who painted this?: Albert Way
When & what style?: 1823 · Romanticism
Where can I see it?: Victoria and Albert Museum

About this work

Eighteen-year-old Albert Way painted his father’s 1823 meeting with the Emir of Mount Lebanon. This watercolor shows the scene inside the Emir’s palace at Bayt al-Din. The artist captured the room’s Eastern-style seating and the small crowd of officials and pages. The work is part of the Romantic movement, focused on detailed scenes of real life. It’s one of the few known paintings by this young artist. Next, look up the Victoria and Albert Museum.

The story of this work

Overview

Albert Way’s 1823 watercolor depicts the Reverend Lewis Way’s audience with Emir Bashir II at the ruler’s palace in Bayt al-Din, Lebanon. The scene shows the emir seated cross-legged on a low divan, with the English visitor and others arranged nearby on a slightly higher seat, while attendants, officers, and officials stand or sit in an Eastern arrangement. The work, executed by the eighteen-year-old artist during a prolonged stay in Lebanon due to plague restrictions, reflects a lively and somewhat naive style. The watercolor later passed through the collection of Walter T. Spencer before…

Read the full account in the museum source.

About the artist

Artist

Albert Way

Albert Way captured a formal meeting on paper in 1823, painting the Revd. Lewis Way talking with a local leader near Lebanon’s mountains. He worked in watercolour during a time when artists used light brushes and…

See the richer artist page