Thomas Gainsborough, R.A. (Sudbury 1727-1788 London)

A lodge in a park, with children descending steps

Details

Thomas Gainsborough, R.A. (Sudbury 1727-1788 London)
A lodge in a park, with children descending steps
oil on canvas
60 x 72¼ in. (152.4 x 183.5 cm.)

Provenance

Probably Schomberg House Sale, March-May 1789, no. 68.
Mrs. Gainsborough Sale, Christie's, 2 June 1792, lot 82 (bought in).
Margaret Gainsborough, 1799.
George, Prince of Wales, later George IV (1762-1830).
Anon [Prince Regent] Sale, Christie's, 29 June 1814, lot 21 (to Rutley).
Sir George Warrender (1782-1849) by 1817, until sold, Christie's, London, 3 June 1837, lot 21 as 'painted by Gainsborough for the Prince of Wales' (to Stewart).
Sir Thomas Baring (1772-1848); his sale, Christie's, London, 2 June 1848, lot 61, as 'a lodge in Windsor Park, with royal children descending some stone steps' (bought in).
Sir Thomas Baring (1799-1873), 1854.
Anon. Sale, Robinson and Fisher's, 21 June 1900, lot 109 (to S.T. Smith).
J. Piepont Morgan, New York, c.1900, and by descent to his daughter
Mrs. George Nichols.
with Coleman Galleries, New York, 1951, from where purchased by
Robert Perret, Kinderhook, New York.

Literature

Athenaeum, 10 June 1848, p. 585.
L. Marvy and W.M. Thackeray, Sketches after English Landscape Painters, London, c.1850.
Dr. Waagen, Treasures of Art in Great Britain, London, 1854, II, p. 189.
G.W. Fulcher, Life of Thomas Gainsborough, R.A., London, 1856, pp. 194 and 204.
W.T. Whitley, Thomas Gainsborough, London, 1915, p. 342.
W.T. Whitley, 'An Eighteenth-Century Art Chronicler: Sir Henry Bate Dudley, Bart.', The Walpole Society, XIII, Oxford, 1925, p. 61.
T. Borenius, 'Gainsborough's Collection of Pictures', Burlington Magazine, May 1944, p. 109.
'American Colonial Mansion' and 'Thackeray on a Gainsborough', Antique Collector, October 1955, p. 223 and 244, illustrated.
E. Waterhouse, Gainsborough, London, 1958, pp. 120-121, no. 991
K. Garlick and A. Macintyre, The Diary of Joseph Farington, London, IV, 1979, p. 1153.
J. Hayes, The Landscape Paintings of Thomas Gainsborough, London, 1982, II, pp. 463-465, no. 116, illustrated.

Exhibited

Probably Schomberg House, 1789, no. 68.
British Institution, 1817, no. 25.
British Institution, 1840, no. 84, as including portraits of George IV and the Princess Royal when children.

Engraved

lithographed by Louis Marvy, c.1850.

Lot Essay

Although the paint surface has now suffered, it is possible to get a sense of the original impact of this major London-period landscape from Marvy's lithograph for the publication, Sketches after English Landscape Painters of circa 1850. The subject of a country house amongst trees was developed from a slightly earlier landscape composition, Wooded Landscape with Drover, of circa 1768-71 (Sotheby's, London, 10 July 1991, lot 74, £190,000). However, Gainsborough has brought the group of buildings forward, producing a more striking effect and grand composition. Two children descend the steps accompanied by a small dog, while a woman herds cows into the middle distance. The motif of the white horse was re-used by the artist in a later composition, Open Landscape with Herdsman (Kansas City).
No doubt the Royal provenance of the present work, which once formed part of the celebrated collection of George IV led the picture to be described as 'A Lodge in Windsor park, with royal children descending the stone steps' at the Christie's sale of 1848, although there seems to be no basis for this description.

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