Chennai, a view of Fort Saint George

Despite never travelling to India, Samuel Scott produced topographical views of Chennai (then known as Madras) and other port cities in the country on commission for the East India Company. Six paintings for the latter were executed in collaboration with George Lambert and date to 1732, early in Scott's career. In his catalogue raisonné, Richard Kingzett suggests that Scott based himself on early 18th-century building plans or an engraving for the architecture, thus accounting for the unusual perspective and proximity of the ships to the shoreline (see R. Kingzett, 'A Catalogue of the Works by Samuel Scott', The Volume of the Walpole Society, XLVIII, London, 1980-82, pp. 69, 71.)