by-nc

View of Domfront, Normandy, from the Rock of Tertre Grisière

Maker

(artist)
1782-1842

Title

View of Domfront, Normandy, from the Rock of Tertre Grisière

Date of Production

1823

Medium

graphite, brown ink and watercolour, with scratching out, on wove paper (heavily rubbed in areas), with some added gum or varnish

Dimensions

Height: 29.5 cm
Width: 41.6 cm

Accession Number

D.1967.WS.22

Mode of Acquisition

William Wycliffe Spooner, bequest, 1967

Credit

The Courtauld, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)

Copyright

Work in the public domain

Location

Not currently on display

Keywords




Label Text

Cotman stayed for a week in Domfront in August 1820 on his third and final tour of Normandy. He found the town ‘extremely grand’, with its dramatic rocky outcrop surmounted by the twelfth-century castle towering above the 200 feet deep Val des Rochers, and drew the view from several vantage points, later working up a number of finished watercolours. In his treatment of rock, Cotman reveals his skill at reducing natural forms to simple geometric shapes, presenting them in flat planes close to the surface.

Provenance

the artist's sale, Christie's (London), 1 May 1824, lot 109 (one of two views of Domfront); Charles Hampden Turner (1772-1856), Rook's Nest, Surrey; his estate sale, Christie's (London), 9 June 1873, lot 176; purchased there by Sir Westrow Hulse (£3); William Wycliffe Spooner, Ilkley (1882-1967); Spooner Bequest 1967

Exhibition History

Earth: Digging Deep in British Art 1715 – 2022, Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, 09/07/2022-11/09/2022

Cotman in Normandy, Dulwich Picture Gallery & London & England, 10/10/2012-13/01/2013 ...More

La Normandie romantique et pittoresque, Musee des Beaux-Arts & Rouen & France, 16/05/2009-16/08/2009

British Watercolours from the Spooner Collection, Huntington Museum and Art Gallery, Los Angeles, 12/02/2005-15/05/2005

British Watercolours from the Spooner Collection, Huntington Museum of Art, Los Angeles, 12/02/2005-15/05/2005; Wordsworth Trust, Grasmere, 18/07/2005-23/10/2005; Hermitage Rooms, Somerset House, London, 16/11/2005-12/02/2006

The Four Elements, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 1996

Great Age of British Watercolours, Royal Academy, London and National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 15/01/1993-25/07/1993

The Northern Landscape: Flemish, Dutch and British Drawings from the Courtauld Collections, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 03/09/1986-30/11/1986; The Drawing Center, New York, 08/04/1986-26/07/1986

John Sell Cotman 1782-1842. A touring exhibition arranged by the Arts Council of Great Britain, V&A, London; Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, City of Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, 1982-83

Masters of the Watercolour - Watercolours from the Spooner
Collection
, Holburne Museum of Art, Bath, 1969

The William Spooner Collection and Bequest, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 01/04/1968-01/07/1968

English Water-Colours: Memorial Exhibition to William Wycliffe
Spooner
, Harrogate, 1968 ...Less

Literature

The Spooner Collection of British Watercolours, Courtauld Institute Galleries; Huntington Library; Wordsworth Trust, 2005-06
cat. no. 64
ill. on p. 201

English Water-Colours: Memorial Exhibition to William Wycliffe Spooner, Harrogate, 1968
cat. no. 61
ill. on p. 11

Troutman, Philip, 'The Evocation of Atmosphere in the English Water-colour' in Apollo, July 1968
no. 77, p. 56 ...More

The William Spooner Collection and Bequest, Courtauld Gallery, London, 1968
cat. no. 82

Rajnai, Miklos and Marjorie Allthorpe-Guyton, John Sell Cotman. Drawings of Normandy in Norwich Castle Museum, Norfolk Museums Service 1975
under no. 22, n. 8

White, Christopher, English landscape 1630-1850, New Haven 1977
p. 102 under no. 180

John Sell Cotman 1782-1842. A touring exhibition arranged by the Arts Council of Great Britain, V&A, London; Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester, City of Bristol Museum and Art Gallery, 1982
no. 90
ill.

The Northern Landscape: Flemish, Dutch and British Drawings from the Courtauld Collections, Courtauld Gallery, London, 1986
cat. no. 79
ill. on p. 183

Brown, David Blayney, Andrew Hemingway, and Anne Lyles, Romantic landscape: the Norwich School of Painters, Tate Gallery, London 2000
p. 112 under no. 77

Cormier, Jean-Philippe, 'John Sell Cotman, peintre de Domfront: une vue extraordinaire de notre-dame-sur-l'eau avant sa destruction partielle' in 'Le Domfrontais Médiéval', 2008-09; 20
pp. 16, 19
ill. on p. 18

Cotman in Normandy, Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, 2012-13
no. 29
ill. and in detail on p. 76

Christiana Payne, Earth: Digging Deep in British Art 1781-2022, Sansom and Company, Redcliffe Press Ltd., Bristol 2022 - 128
36-37
ill. on p. 37 ...Less

Inscriptions

Watermark: Watermark: none.

Inscription: Recto: lower left corner, brown ink, signed by the artist: "JS Cotman / 1823".

Collector's mark: none.

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