Puritan " After the Jibe"

The painting depicts the Alden designed schooner Puritan racing  in the Mediterranean with the Herreshoff schooner Mariette and the Gardner designed 3 masted schooner Atlantic. Puritan has just Jibed around the mark in chase of Mariette whilst Atlantic, under charter watches from a distance.

Puritan was designed by John Alden for New York Yacht club member Edward W Brown in 1929 and after delays caused by the stock market crash of 1930 finally  launched on the 25th April 1931, making her one of the only luxury yachts built during the great depression.

 Puritan participated in the 1931 New York Yacht Club cruise that included amongst other famous yachts the Americas Cup contenders from 1919 Resolute and Vanitie and the 1930 J Class Weetamoe.

 Upon the death of her owner Puritan was  purchased  in 1933 by Harry J Bauer of California where she spent the rest of her pre war years.

Puritan subsequently had a colourful career including serving with the Navy during the 2nd world war .

 In 1972 she was rescued as a wreck by Patsy Kennedy and Bill Bolling who lovingly restored her to her former condition.

Today Puritan as part of “The Classic Yacht Experience” is to be found cruising the Mediterranean and participating in the various Classic Yacht regattas of the “International Schooner Association.

Specifications

Length over all 126ft

Length on deck 103.3 ft

Beam 23ft

Draft 9 ft

Concept Development

Brenton Reef An Cape May Coarse

My Historic recreations are inspired by reading contemporary race reports. Often I’ll plot the race out noting wind direction, sea state and time of day, this is accompanied by creating a story board of the race . The purpose of the story board is to illustrate the key moments of the race . Creating the story board will often spark the ideas which I later work out with various composition thumbnails

Ingomar vs Meteor 3 Cowes week 1904

Built alongside the 1903 Americas Cup Defender Reliance, Ingomar was the first of Nat Herreshoffs’ 9 great schooners that would include Westward and Elena. Built for Morton F Plant, a principal owner of a line of Steam ships, Ingomar quickly proved herself very fast, with her huge rig and deep draft she won nearly every race for her class on the New York Yacht Club cruise of 1903 including the prestigious Astor Cup for schooners.

In 1904 with Charlie Barr in command, she crossed over to Europe principally to win back the “Cape May Cup” which had been won by the kings Britannia against Navahoe in 1893. Charlie Barr raced Ingomar very successfully both in Germany and England returning home with 17 trophies, making her the most successful schooner since the Yacht America. Unfortunately, the deed of gift for the Cape May Cup meant that as Britannia had been sold out of the Royal Yacht Squadron, the Cape May Cup had to be returned to the New York Yacht Club in any case.

Her principal opponent in European waters was the Kaisers 2 year old Meteor 3, a huge schooner with a 120ft waterline. The Kaiser had ordered Meteor 3 from the American yacht designer A Cary Smith who had designed the schooner Yampa that had so impressed The Kaiser on her trip to Europe in 1897.

Meteor 3 proved no match for Ingomar with an aggressive Charlie Barr at the helm and was roundly defeated in both the heavy wind conditions in Germany and the lighter conditions in the Solent.

The painting depicts the two great adversaries as they race through Osborn Bay during Cowes Week 1904.

A replica of Ingomar is currently under construction and will undoubtedly be seen shortly racing in The Mediterranean alongside the other great Herreshoff schooners Elena, Elenora, Mariette and Vagrant.

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Specifications

Ingomar

• Length over all 127 feet

• Length on the water line 86 feet 1 inch

• Beam 24 feet 2 inches

• Draft 16 feet 3 inches

Meteor 3

• Length over all 161 feet

• Length on the waterline 120 feet

• Beam 27 feet

• Draft 15 feet

London delivery

Today I had the chance for a little sightseeing as I delivered my latest painting “Ingomar vs Meteor 3” to the Rountree Tryon gallery in London. It was a great day out crowned by a beautiful sunset over the solent on my return.

Seaview photoshoot.

Today I had a great trip out photographing Seaview . The day was perfect for photography and sketching local land marks. Many thanks to Lee who kindly ferried me around from place to place in his rib and Ben my son who had the chance to drive, even if he did want to go fast and forgot about the artist hanging over the back.