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Wooded landscape with a seated woman and an artist sketching

Maker

(artist)
1757-1827

Title

Date of Production

(circa) 1790 - 1800

Medium

graphite, pen and brown ink, watercolour on wove paper, laid down on artist's mount with wash border

Dimensions

Height: 23.2 cm
Width: 30 cm

Accession Number

D.1986.WS.83.1

Mode of Acquisition

The Spooner Charitable Trust, gift, 1986

Credit

The Courtauld, London (Samuel Courtauld Trust)

Copyright

Work in the public domain

Location

Not currently on display

Keywords

Label Text

William Gilpin’s remarks in Forest Scenery (1808) on the picturesqueness of weeping willows, whose natural scene is ‘some romantic foot-path bridge, which it half conceals — or some glassy pool, over which it hangs its streaming foliage’, precisely match this image. In fact, Rowlandson’s subject is most probably an anti-picturesque satire aimed at the gentleman amateur comfortably engaged in producing a watercolour of his grounds, with lake, fashionable chinoiserie bridge and specimen trees, notably a large weeping willow.

Notes

Around 1790 Rowlandson began to use the red-brown ink ink with which he has strengthened the outlines of the man, dog and chair. The white muslin dress and bonnet of the woman, and the man's tall hat, also suggest a date around 1790 or later, although there is as yet no sign of the neo-classical elongation of the figure which can be seen in his work after 1800.

Provenance

Colnaghi (London), acquired July 1945 (based on inventory number inscribed on verso); Fine Art Society (London), February 1946, no. 91; Mrs Mary Spooner; Spooner Gift 1986

Exhibition History

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

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. 36
ill. on p. 145

English Water-Colours: Memorial Exhibition to William Wycliffe Spooner, Harrogate, 1968
cat. no. 27

The William Spooner Collection and Bequest, Courtauld Gallery, London, 1968
cat. no. 43

Inscriptions

Watermark: Watermark: none.

Inscription: Verso: centre, graphite, obscured by backing sheet: "3/8 blk / Clean margin. / Damp top to straighten"; lower left edge, graphite, Colnaghi number and price: "A13142 AX/-/-". Backboard (removed, recorded in file): brown crayon: "27"; graphite, circled, FAS 1946 number: "91" [see label formerly on the frame].

Label: Frame (removed, in file): printed in black, filled in with pen and brown ink: "THE FINE ART SOCIETY, LTD., / 148 NEW BOND STREET, LONDON, W.1 / By Appointment to H.M. QUEEN MARY / TITLE Woody Landscape (Artist Sketching) / Watercolour by / ARTIST Thos Rowlandson / No. 91 DATE Feb 1946"; Removed, in object file: written in black ink, from the Fine Art Society: "Woody Landscape wcl / F.A.S. / Artist Sketching / T. Rowlandson / No. 4107 P. ts/gs/- S Rf/Rff".

Collector's mark: none.

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