Somerset & Wood Fine Art

Somerset & Wood Fine Art Somerset & Wood was born out of a shared love of art, history, design & collecting. We offer selecte We have a passion for English antique art.

Somerset & Wood was born out of a shared love of art, history, design and collecting. Our vision is to share this online through our blog, and to offer specially selected artworks for sale at very affordable prices. All our artworks are guaranteed original, one-off collectors’ pieces. We specialise in English 19th- and early 20th-century works on paper. With combined expertise from working in the

fine art trade and for national museums across the UK, we have an interest in researching and bringing lesser-known artists into prominence. And, most importantly, as collectors (‘curators’) ourselves, we deal only in works that we think are of value and would ourselves be excited to own. It is vital to us that our works are original and unique, because, to us, here lies the joy of art. An artwork is an authentic and tangible creation from a singular imagination. When viewed – held – owned, a connection forms between the creator and viewer. In a world where products are becoming increasingly disposable and transactions impersonal, we celebrate these personal connections, across centuries – and, with the global dialogues enabled by the online marketplace, across continents.

- https://somersetandwood.com

Interesting to learn this week about the keeping of bird menageries in 18th-century England, as symbols of wealth and En...
23/06/2026

Interesting to learn this week about the keeping of bird menageries in 18th-century England, as symbols of wealth and Enlightenment curiosity. Our new collection of bird illustrations by William Hayes (1735–1802) et al. (no less than seven members of his family or 'pupils' collaborated on his works) are a striking record of this endeavour. Hayes is known as the first artist to record a single private collection of live birds, his most famous commission being the illustration of the menagerie at Osterley Park, Middlesex, owned by Robert and Sarah Child. Osterley Park contained over ninety-seven different species of bird, cared for by a 'Menagerie Man' called Jonathan Chipps. Hayes's illustrations were hung in the menagerie, and subsequently published as 'Portraits of Rare and Curious Birds, with their Descriptions, from the Menagery of Osterley Park [sic]', 1794–1799.

Hayes's illustrative style was largely decorative and the acquisition of exotic birds was often more a matter of aesthetics than science, feeding a broader vogue for Asian decorative objects and styles; exotic birds would adorn not only in garden menageries but porcelain, textiles and wallpaper. Visiting Osterley Park in 1772, Agneta Yorke wrote to Lady Beauchamp Proctor that she thought it, ‘The prettiest place I ever saw, ’tis an absolute retreat, & fill’d with all sorts of curious and scarce Birds and Fowles, among the rest 2 Numidian Cranes that follow like Dogs, and a pair of Chinese teal that have only been seen in England before upon the India paper.'

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The miniature draughtsmanship in this drawing by the French artist Thomas Charles Naudet (1773–1810) is just beautiful. ...
20/06/2026

The miniature draughtsmanship in this drawing by the French artist Thomas Charles Naudet (1773–1810) is just beautiful. The North African Islamic wedding procession, titled 'Mariage Moresque', was reproduced in the French travel anthology 'Choix de voyages dans les quatre parties du monde, ou précis des voyages les plus intéressans, par terre et par mer, entrepris depuis l'année 1806 jusqu'à ce jour', published between 1821 and 1823. Naudet frequently travelled on the Continent, first spending time in Rome in 1809, where his portrait was drawn by his friend Ingres at the Villa Medici. He presented his works at the Salon regularly, between 1795 and his early death, in 1810, and his drawings were highly regarded by contemporary collectors, including Dominique Vivant-Denon, the first director of the Louvre.

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We list dozens of new stock items every month. Sign up to our email newsletter via our website to receive first look whe...
18/06/2026

We list dozens of new stock items every month. Sign up to our email newsletter via our website to receive first look when new pictures are listed.

View all new stock at somersetandwood.com/collections/new-acquisitions

This fine sheet of meticulously executed anatomical studies was drawn by Hans Anderla in Vienna in 1888. Anderla was pos...
07/06/2026

This fine sheet of meticulously executed anatomical studies was drawn by Hans Anderla in Vienna in 1888. Anderla was possibly associated with the presitigious Medical University of Vienna, which was celebrated for having one of the world's largest anatomical wax models collections to be used for training purposes. The models were commissioned by Emperor Joseph II between 1784 and 1786 and crafted by Florence masters. Just under 1,200 elaborately finished anatomical wax models were transported on pack donkeys from Florence to Vienna. The models were displayed in ornate Venetian hand-blown glass cases, which could be opened by students. Accompanying the models were coloured drawings mounted on the walls above, while explanatory sheets in three languages—Latin, Italian and German—were stored in drawers below.

Squeamish look away now!

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This animated miniature street scene captures the bustling canal-side activity in 18th-century Amsterdam. Likely drawn a...
06/06/2026

This animated miniature street scene captures the bustling canal-side activity in 18th-century Amsterdam. Likely drawn around the 1760s by the Dutch painter and engraver Reinier Vinkeles (1741–1816), the view includes one of the distinctive horse-drawn sleighs (known as the ‘toeslede’ or ‘sleepkoets’) for which the city was known. Due to heavy taxes applied to wheeled vehicles, the wheel-less sleighs became a primary mode of urban public transit. The sleds were dragged across the cobblestone streets, with an oily cloth used to smooth the passage. The coachman walked alongside to guide the horse.

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The lodge in this charming view is the summer retreat of the Urmstons at Dalhousie, India. Amateur artist Henry Brabazon...
21/05/2026

The lodge in this charming view is the summer retreat of the Urmstons at Dalhousie, India. Amateur artist Henry Brabazon Urmston served in the Bengal Army 1847–74. He held various positions, including Assistant Commissioner in the Punjab with special duty in Kashmir during 1857, and Deputy Commissioner in Peshawar, Bannu, Sialkot, Amritsar and Rawalpindi.

In 1850 he married Harriett Elizabeth Hughes (1828–1897)—possibly the women at the right of the picture—who had arrived in India earlier that year as a Christian missionary, a calling to which she was to devote her life in both India and later in the UK. Her mission was not to the people of India, but initially to the wives of the soldiers. Her meetings attracted the husbands too and she was known as ‘Holy Mary’. After their return to the UK in 1875 due to ill health, she spent years—unusually for a woman—preaching in support of the Zenana Bible and Medical Missionary Society.

The child at the left is likely one of their daughters; the Urmstons had eight children—in 1861 they would have had two daughters aged eight and three.

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A selection of works from our Vienna Secession Ex Libris Bookplates 1900–1925 collection—fabulous examples of European M...
12/05/2026

A selection of works from our Vienna Secession Ex Libris Bookplates 1900–1925 collection—fabulous examples of European Modernism, telling interesting stories of the connections between artist and book owner, and the cultural lives of intellectuals in pre-war Austria-Hungary. A number of the designers are Austrian Jewish, Hungarian or Czech, who were profoundly affected by horrors of war: Antal Radó (1862–1944), a Hungarian journalist and translator committed su***de when Germany occupied Hungary; Josef Váchal (1884–1969), the Czech visionary, was traumatised by serving on the Italian front during World War I and he went into internal exile to avoid N**i occupation in the 1940s; and Josef von Divéky (1887–1951), a Hungarian graphic artist and designer, had work confiscated from the Schlossmuseum Weimar and destroyed as part of the N**i ‘Degenerate Art’ campaign.

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A selection of works from our Vienna Secession Ex Libris Bookplates 1900–1925 collection—fabulous examples of European M...
12/05/2026

A selection of works from our Vienna Secession Ex Libris Bookplates 1900–1925 collection—fabulous examples of European Modernism, telling interesting stories of the connections between artist and book owner, and the cultural lives of intellectuals in pre-war Austria-Hungary. A number of the designers are Austrian Jewish, Hungarian or Czech, who were profoundly affected by horrors of war: Antal Radó (1862–1944), a Hungarian journalist and translator committed su***de when Germany occupied Hungary; Josef Váchal (1884–1969), the Czech visionary, was traumatised by serving on the Italian front during World War I and he went into internal exile to avoid N**i occupation in the 1940s; and Josef von Divéky (1887–1951), a Hungarian graphic artist and designer, had work confiscated from the Schlossmuseum Weimar and destroyed as part of the N**i 'Degenerate Art' campaign.

🛒 View the full collection at somersetandwood.com
🌍 Free Delivery Worldwide

We list dozens of new stock items every month. Sign up to our email newsletter via our website to receive first look whe...
30/04/2026

We list dozens of new stock items every month. Sign up to our email newsletter via our website to receive first look when new pictures are listed.

View all new stock at somersetandwood.com/new

Address

54B Frome Road
Bradford-on-Avon
BA151LA

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm

Telephone

+441225864571

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