Thomas Gainsborough, R.A.* (1727-1788)

A river Landscape with Travellers resting on the edge of a Wood, a horse-drawn Cart before a Bridge and Donkeys on a Bank

Details

Thomas Gainsborough, R.A.* (1727-1788)
A river Landscape with Travellers resting on the edge of a Wood, a horse-drawn Cart before a Bridge and Donkeys on a Bank
oil on canvas
30½ x 50½in. (77.5 x 128.3cm.)

Provenance

Possibly William Beckford (1759-1844) and by descent to
Susan, Duchess of Hamilton (d. 1859) as The Lakes of Cumberland.
Duke of Hamilton; Christie's, London, Nov. 6-7 (=1st day), 1919, lot 19 (2,800gns. to Thos. Agnew & Son, London).
with Duveen, given by him to Sir Philip Sassoon circa 1928; his sale, Christie's, London, April 27, 1934, lot 102.
with Arthur Tooth.
William A. Coolidge and thence by descent.

Literature

G. Fulcher, Life of Gainsborough, 1856, p. 231.
Sir Walter Armstrong, Gainsborough and His Place in English Art, 1898, p. 205.
Sir Walter Armstrong, Thomas Gainsborough, 1904, p. 283.
E. Waterhouse, Gainsborough, 1958, p. 108, no. 842.
J. Hayes, The Landscape Paintings of Thomas Gainsborough, 1982, II, p. 408, no. 70, illustrated.
K. Esielonis, in P.C. Sutton ed., The William Appleton Coolidge Collection, 1995, pp. 149-50, no. 37.

Lot Essay

John Hayes dated the present painting to the later years of Gainsborough's Suffolk period and noted its indebtedness to both Dutch Italianate landscapists such as Nicolaes Berchem, Jan Both etc. and Claude Lorraine (for example compare the stand of trees delicately silhouetted against the sky on the right with those of Claude). One of Gainsborough's favorite motifs, the denuded tree on the left descends via Jacob Ruisdael from earlier Northern landscape painters like Roelandt Savery and Abraham Bloemaert. The broad horizontal format was also favored by the artist and could indicate that it was designed for a particular place in a room, possibly an overmantel or overdoor; compare, for example, the earlier extensive landscapes in the Duke of Norfolk's collection, Arundel Castle, and the National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, Inv. no. 2174 (respectively Hayes nos. 49 and 29, illustrated). In dating this painting circa 1757-8, Hayes (op. cit., p. 408) compared its techniques and pale palette to Gainsborough's Open Landscape with Rustic Lovers in the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Inv. no. ACF.42.2 (Hayes, no. 67, illustrated) and its fluent modeling and such details as the horse cart to the Wooded Landscape in a private collection, Newcastle, Australia (Hayes, no. 68, illustrated).