sketcher(?) and ship’s carpenter, was a son of the artist John Cleveley, and brother of the twins John and Robert, both of whom were artists. John Cleveley junior had been one of the party of artists whom Joseph Banks had intended to accompany him in the Resolution on Captain Cook’s second voyage; when Banks changed his mind about going John junior accompanied him on a tour to Iceland instead.
James Cleveley accompanied Cook on his third voyage in the Resolution as a ship’s carpenter. He has often been described as 'unofficial artist’ to the expedition because four monotone aquatint prints (1787-88) were described in their prospectus as 'taken on the spot by Mr. JAMES CLEVELY [sic] of the RESOLUTION ship of war, and afterwards re-drawn, and inimitably printed in water-colours by his brother, the late celebrated artist, Mr. JOHN CLEVELY, and from which the plates were engraved, in his best manner, by Mr. JUKES’. The prints also bear the caption, 'Drawn on the spot by Jas. Clevely’.
Joppien and Smith, however, are not convinced that James Cleveley drew the original sketches. They note that this is the only evidence that James ever sketched. He is not mentioned as a draughtsman in any of the third voyage journals, nor are any of his sketches extant. Rather, Joppien and Smith believe that the watercolours from which the prints were made were inventions by John junior, who had similarly 'skilfully made up’ paintings of John Phipps’s expedition to the Arctic in 1773. They suggest that John junior would have had easy access through Banks to John Webber 's Resolution sketches and that these would have provided enough visual information for John junior’s watercolour, A View in Moorea (1784, Mitchell Library), on which one of Jukes’s prints is based. The National Library holds a similar View of Moorea in oils, catalogued as by the third brother, Robert – which further complicates the story.
- Writers:
- Staff Writer
- Date written:
- 1992
- Last updated:
- 2011
