Customer, Counsel, Associate, “Trustee”: Charles Fairfax Murray and Thomas Agnew and Sons (1886–1918)

The chapter focuses on the last two decades of the life and career – as connoisseur, collector and dealer – of the painter Charles Fairfax Murray (1849-1919). These were dominated by his association with the leading London art dealers, Thomas Agnew and Sons, and in particular with Lockett Agnew (1858-1918). Though long known, this association has never been the object of informed analysis. Examination of the firm’s surviving business records has revealed its scope and scale, as well as its multiple modes of interaction, and forms the basis of the account presented here. Focusing in particular on transactions in paintings, the chapter attempts an analysis of the five modes of business relationship – as customer, joint purchaser, sharer in profit and supplier of services – defining Murray’s association with the firm between 1893 and 1918. It thereby sheds light on the collaborative dynamics of the Agnew’s business in general and on the innovative force of Murray’s collaboration with the firm in particular. Finally, it offers a portrait of Murray as both an astute and resourceful businessman and also a collector who, in R. H: Benson’s words, “regarded himself as trustee of most of his artistic possessions.”