This scene of rural life in southern England, created in 1828, attests to Nasmyth’s admiration for seventeenth-century Dutch landscape painting. The minutely detailed depiction of the terrain creates the impression of a naturalistic view of the countryside, but the composition is carefully composed, with an eye toward pleasing contrasts. The sunny woodland is dominated by the tall, dark tree at the left, which creates a counterpoint to the cloudbanks in the sky at the right. Nasmyth painted several versions of the subject, which proved quite popular.
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Credit Line:Bequest of Maria DeWitt Jesup, from the collection of her husband, Morris K. Jesup, 1914
Accession Number:15.30.56
The son of the Edinburgh painter Alexander Nasmyth, Patrick Nasmyth settled in London in 1810. He continued to exhibit at the most important venues in Edinburgh, and in London showed at the Royal Academy, the Society of British Artists, and the British Institution. Influenced by seventeenth-century Dutch landscape painters, he was admiringly referred to as "the English Hobbema" in an obituary. Later in the nineteenth century his style became popular and widely imitated.
A more or less identical painting called Landscape, Pool and Tree—on wood, practically the same size, and likewise signed and dated 1828—is in the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. The dogs are omitted, and the figures are not as solidly drawn. A smaller, undated version on canvas (location unknown), representing the same scene but with many slight changes, was identified as View near Godstone in 1924, when in the collection of Colonel Douglas James Proby. It differs in showing a woman riding a white horse accompanied by a man on foot in the background at the left. A fourth version (location unknown), the smaller size but on wood, signed and dated 1828, was on the London art market in 1976 with the title Near Clifton; it was sold at Sotheby's, London, in 1983 as a view of Godstone. For some reason, the subject was exceptionally popular and at least one further large version on panel, lighter and feathery in handling, has been sold repeatedly at auction.
Penshurst and Godstone lie to the south of London and are separated by no more than several miles. The church shown here is St. John the Baptist, Penshurst. This view was certainly influenced by seventeenth-century painters: Meindert Hobbema, Jacob van Ruisdael, or perhaps Jan Wijnants. Typically for Nasmyth, four versions are on panel, which may be symptomatic of the importance for him of the Dutch School. The technique is minutely precise and detailed. The present landscape, unpublished in the modern era and rarely exhibited, is in impeccable state, having been cleaned in 2004, for the first time since acquired by the Museum nearly a century ago.
[2012; adapted from Baetjer 2009]
Inscription: Signed and dated (lower left): Pat..k Nasmyth. 1828
Ralph Brocklebank, Childwall Hall, near Liverpool (by 1868–d. 1892; posthumous sale, Christie's, London, April 29, 1893, no. 71, as "Landscape, Exhibited . . . 1868", for £787.10.0 to Agnew); [Agnew, London, from 1893]; [Arthur Tooth]; Morris K. Jesup, New York (until d. 1908); Maria DeWitt (Mrs. Morris K.) Jesup, New York (1908–d. 1914)
Leeds Art Gallery. "National Exhibition of Works of Art," 1868, no. 1164 (as "Landscape," lent by R. Brocklebank).
Josephine L. Allen and Elizabeth E. Gardner. A Concise Catalogue of the European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1954, p. 72.
Peter Johnson and Ernle Money. The Nasmyth Family of Painters. Leigh-on-Sea, 1977, p. 59, as "Wooded Scene in Kent"; illustrate, courtesy of Oscar and Peter Johnson, a painting of identical composition titled "Landscape near Godstone, Surrey," which is signed and dated 1828.
Katharine Baetjer. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born Before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995, p. 205, ill.
Katharine Baetjer. British Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1575–1875. New York, 2009, pp. 258–60, no. 124, ill. (color).
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