Archive: SDK Sydney Decimus Kitson Archive
Date: [1926-37]
Reference Number: SDK/1/2/4/1
Description
J.S. Cotman. Reeve Collection. British Museum, a notebook containing Kitson's lists, notes and sketches of Cotmans in the Reeve collection at the British Museum. London.
The early twentieth century revival of interest in John Sell Cotman owed much to James Reeve (1833-1920), the Norwich collector and Curator of Norwich Museum (1851-1910), who acquired many works by Cotman and his Norfolk contemporaries. Reeve's contributions to exhibitions in Norwich and in London in 1888-89 re-established Cotman's reputation and attracted the interest of Laurence Binyon, Assistant Keeper in the Department of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum, who published studies of Cotman in 1897 and 1903. Reeve sold his collection to the British Museum in 1902, making it the foremost public holding of the artist's work.