Yale Center for British Art

Creator:
Michael "Angelo" Rooker, 1746–1801, British
Title:
The Chapel of the Greyfriars Monastery, Winchester
Date:
between 1790 and 1795
Materials & Techniques:
Watercolor on moderately thick, slightly textured, cream wove paper
Dimensions:
Sheet: 9 x 11 1/8 inches (22.9 x 28.3 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:
Inscribed in graphite, lower center: "Chapel of the Grey Friar Monastery Winchester"
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1975.4.1718
Classification:
Drawings & Watercolors
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
pitchforks | architectural subject | resting | hay | dog (animal) | rakes | hoes | genre subject | fence | ruins | monastery | trees | men
Associated Places:
United Kingdom | England | Hampshire | Winchester | Winchester Cathedral Priory | Winchester Cathedral
Currently On View:
Not on view
Exhibition History:
Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (Yale Center for British Art, 2008-06-09 - 2008-08-17)

Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (The State Hermitage Museum, 2007-10-23 - 2008-01-13)

Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 2007-07-11 - 2007-09-30)

The Line of Beauty : British Drawings and Watercolors of the Eighteenth Century (Yale Center for British Art, 2001-05-19 - 2001-08-05)

Oil on Water - Oil Sketches by British Watercolorists (Yale Center for British Art, 1986-08-26 - 1986-11-09)

English Landscape (Paul Mellon Collection) 1630-1850 (Yale Center for British Art, 1977-04-19 - 1977-07-17)
Publications:
An exhibition of English drawings and water colors from the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, February 18-April 1, 1962, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1962, p. 41, no. 57, NC228 U6 (YCBA) Copy 2 is on Mellon Shelf

John Baskett, English drawings and watercolors, 1550-1850, in the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon , The Morgan Library & Museum, New York, 1972, pp. 38-39, no. 51, NC228 B37+ (YCBA)

Malcolm Cormack, Oil on water : oil sketches by British watercolorists, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 1986, p. 50, fig. 52, ND467 C67 (YCBA)

Sotheby's sale catalogue : Catalogue of fine paintings and drawings of the English school : 30 November 1960, Sotheby's, London, November 30, 1960, p. 21, lot 81, Auction catalogues (YCBA)

Christopher White, English landscape, 1630-1850 : drawings, prints & books from the Paul Mellon Collection, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 1977, pp. 34-35, no. 51, fig. LXXIV, NC228 W45 OVERSIZE (YCBA)

Scott Wilcox, Line of beauty : British drawings and watercolors of the eighteenth century, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 2001, p. 168, no. 139, NC228 W53 2001 (YCBA)

Yale Center for British Art, Great British watercolors : from the Paul Mellon Collection, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2007, pp. 36-37, no. 12, ND1928 .Y35 2007 (LC)+ Oversize (YCBA)
Gallery Label:
Michael Rooker began his career as a pupil of Paul Sandby, who dubbed him "Michelangelo," a moniker he retained for the rest of his life. Sandby was being gently ironic, for Rooker's work was hardly Michelangelesque. Instead, Rooker perfected topographical views that conformed to the late eighteenth-century vogue for the picturesque, an aesthetic middle way between the sublime and the beautiful. Here the ruined monastery has the roughness of the sublime but none of its horror and the calm serenity of the beautiful without its cloying regularity. Gallery label for Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (Yale Center for British Art, 2008-06-09 - 2008-08-17)
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:12914