English School (17th century), Five Portraits of members of the Yate family of Arlington

English School (17th century)Portraits of members of the Yate family: Richard Yate of Arlingham, Gloucestershire (1660-1701); his wife Elizabeth, (d.1705); and their children, John (d.1749), Dorothy (d.1762) and CharlesOil on canvas, ovalWith extensive inscriptions on labels attached to their reverseEach 34 x 30cm (13¼ x 11¾ in.) (5)According to the indistinct inscriptions on the reverses of all five pictures Richard Yate of Arlingham was Lieutenant-Colonel of the Forces of the County of Gloucester. He married Elizabeth Price, daughter of Major Thomas Price of Gloucester. Their second son John was an eminent barrister at law and lived at Colthrop, Gloucestershire. He married Jane co-heiress of William Barnesey Esq of the County of Hereford and widow of F Valum (?) Esq of Bilbury. They are both buried in the Sepulchral Chapel built by Colonel Yate at Bromesberrow. Dorothy was the 2nd daughter of Richard and Elizabeth Yate. She married Thomas Pyrke Esq of Little Dean and bore him 4 sons and 2 daughters, she survived them all and her husband and died the 24th Jan 1762 aged 76.It is rare to find a set of family portraits of this period painted on such a diminutive scale and presented in their original carved and gilded oval frames. The Pinkers Collection of British, American and European Folk Art This charming collection of folk art takes its name from a diminutive 17th Century cottage on the Kent coast where it has hung and grown in size over the last twenty years. It includes watercolours and oil paintings from the 17th to the early 20th Century. Many are in their original frames and in remarkably fresh condition. Despite its rural location and the provincial subject matter of the works it is a truly international collection and many of the lots have come from some of the most important collectors and dealers in folk art on both sides of the Atlantic including Robert Young, Denzil Grant and Charles Plante in England and David Wheatcroft, Joan Brownstein and Austin Miller in America.Folk Art has been described as 'the unselfconscious creativity of academically untrained artists' (Robert Young, Folk Art, 1999) and it is this quality that gives many of the works an immediacy and playfulness that has chimed with generations of collectors. Some of the pictures, by journeymen artists, artisans or amateurs are provincial reinterpretations of more sophisticated works, such as the early 18th Century Yate family portraits (lot 122). Others have a joyful disregard of accepted ideas of scale, perspective and colouring, giving them a timeless quality which draws parallels with 20th Century artists including Alfred Wallis and John Nash, such as View from La Moinerie (lot 120) and the American School Portrait of a girl (lot 103) has an Outsider Art quality reminiscent of the Art Brut movement founded by Jean Dubuffet. Regardless of their origins this unique and varied collection is the manifestation of the vision and passion of a true collector.