Townsend's Building at Rousham, Oxfordshire: Elevation and Plan
Date:
ca. 1738
Materials & Techniques:
Graphite, pen and brown wash within single-ruled pencil border on moderately thick, slightly textured, cream laid paper
Dimensions:
Sheet: 13 1/2 x 9 11/16 inches (34.3 x 24.6 cm)
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1975.2.154
Gallery Label:
Colonel Robert Dormer commissioned William Kent to alter the house and gardens at Rousham, Oxfordshire, from 1737 to 1741. This drawing may be a preliminary design for the Townsend temple at Rousham, though the executed temple sits on a site that is too small for this design. The proposed temple consists of an elongated octagonal building between porches, faced with an Ionic order and raised on a low stepped podium. The temple as built is also octagonal in plan but it is much smaller, with a Doric portico in antis and a seat inside. This drawing, however, envisages a much larger building at approximately 42 feet wide, with a 22-foot wide center range. On the front elevation, attached columns frame the door and pilasters mark the corners. The drawing is recognizably Kent’s, with his unsteady pen line, hatching for emphasis, and a bar scale in his hand. The tree in the background is similar to another drawing by him in the Center’s collection (see entrance screen B1975.2.151). Gallery label for installation of YCBA collection, 2014
