Watercolor and pen and brown ink on medium, slightly textured, cream laid paper
Dimensions:
Mount: 12 3/4 × 24 7/8 inches (32.4 × 63.2 cm)
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1977.14.6293
Gallery Label:
Forgotten for over a century, Francis Towne's watercolors were rediscovered in the early twentieth century and recognized as some of the finest drawings of the eighteenth century. Towne's technique of using watercolor within carefully penned outlines was entirely conventional, but his ability to abstract views into strikingly simplified patterns gives his work a uniquely modern feel. This view of Lake Coniston was made in 1786 on a tour of the Lake District, the panoramic format requiring two pages of a sketchbook that Towne filled and subsequently dismantled. In this case the join in the middle has been left prominently to indicate that this was a view "drawn on the spot," as Towne liked to put it. 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)