FLYING CLOUD - Original Pencil Drawing

An original pencil working drawing by Robert Taylor, created during the development of his celebrated maritime painting Flying Cloud.

The study lays out the composition that would later become the finished published image, with the famous American clipper Flying Cloud dominating the harbour scene as smaller vessels, shoreline activity and distant shipping establish the busy setting of nineteenth-century Hong Kong.

Built for speed during the great era of the American clipper ships, Flying Cloud became legendary for her record-breaking passages and for the remarkable role of navigator Eleanor Creesy, at a time when a woman holding such responsibility at sea was highly unusual. Robert’s finished painting shows the ship arriving at Hong Kong before continuing to Foochow to load tea for the lucrative return journey.

The final artwork was published as American Clipper Flying Cloud in 1993, but this original working drawing offers something quite different: a direct insight into Robert’s creative process, showing how the principal forms, perspective and atmosphere of the eventual painting were first established in pencil.

For collectors of Robert’s work, an original preparatory drawing connected to a recognised published image has particular appeal, bridging the gap between the artist’s initial concept and the finished painting.

Original pencil working drawing on paper. 23" x 16".