Horseguards Parade from St James's Park

Horseguards Parade from St James's Park is an undated oil on canvas by the English painter Henry Pether, measuring 45.1 × 60.3 cm; it was sold at Christie's online sale British & European Art, which closed on 29 July 2020.

Henry Pether (1800–1880) was the son of the landscape painter Abraham Pether and the younger brother of Sebastian Pether; because all three specialised in moonlit scenes they were known as the 'Moonlight Pethers'. Henry's pictures are generally more realistic and refined than those of his father and brother, and he usually signed them. He exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1828 and 1862 and painted moonlit views along the Thames, many between 1850 and 1865, as well as in Paris, Venice and Scotland. He also patented lamps, tiles and building materials, and his work is represented in Tate, Royal Museums Greenwich and the Yale Center for British Art.

The view looks east across the lake in St James's Park toward Horse Guards, the Palladian building designed by William Kent and built from 1750 as barracks and stables for the Household Cavalry; until 1858 it was also the army's headquarters, and its arch is the gateway between the park and Whitehall. The lake itself took its natural shape in John Nash's remodelling of the park in 1826–27. Pether places the full moon low on the right, so that its light breaks through the clouds and lays a bright path across the water, while the clock tower of Horse Guards and the buildings along the parade stand as a pale silhouette on the far shore. In the foreground, a wooden boathouse, trees and a pair of swans on the bank are picked out in silvery light and deep shadow, an approach typical of the family's nocturnes.

Christie's estimated the painting at £5,000–8,000, and it sold for £7,500. The image has since been recorded on Wikidata as a work by Henry Pether.