PROVENANCE Private Collection, United Kingdom

John Barr Clarke Hoyte is prominent amongst landscapist of the 1860s-70s, being one of the leading watercolourist of that era. The work illustrated above is an early record of the Auckland waterfront taken, as titled, from Stokes Point North now the site of the North Shore end of the Auckland Harbour Bridge.

The panorama chronicles the urban development of Auckland in great detail, providing an important record of the growing cityscape in the 1860s. In 1871 the Auckland Harbour Board was formed which would oversee dramatic changes to the original line of the foreshore. Many of Auckland's early industries from the 19th century vanished as the reclamations spread out. Hoyte later completed a larger watercolour painting of this scene titled, View of Auckland Harbour from Stokes Point, which was gifted by Sir Henry Brett to the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki in 1913.

The forementioned painting was featured in Una Platts' notable exhibition John Barr Clarke Hoyte in 1957 (catalogue entry no.15). As stated in Platts exhibition catalogue the painting was exhibited with Society of Arts, Auckland, in 1871 and described in the New Zealand Herald, March 3, 1871, as 'taken from above Stokes Point, and embracing at a glance the entire harbour, city and surrounding islands and country'.

*Lot 57 can be viewed in further detail on the inside back cover of the catalogue