Landscape with hills, a lake, and figures

ca. 1772

Not on view

Gilpin's ideas concering the picturesque are here demonstrated using monochrome ink washes. While working as the enlightened head of a boys's school, then vicar at Boldre in the New Forest from 1777, Gilpin wrote essays that defined this new aesthetic concept associated with pleasingly irregular forms situated between beauty and sublimity. During summer tours, Gilpin visited Wales, the Scottish Highlands and other remote corners of the Britain to seek picturesque sites, and his subsequent travelogues encouraged Britons to do likewise. When continental travel was restricted by two decades of war with France, a new form of tourism emerged centered on pleasing vistas rather than famous landmarks.

Artwork Details

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Signatures, Inscriptions, and Markings

Provenance

Title: Landscape with hills, a lake, and figures
Artist: William Gilpin (British, Scaleby, Cumbria 1724–1804 Boldre, Hampshire)
Date: ca. 1772
Medium: Pen and black ink, brush and gray wash, on buff paper
Dimensions: Sheet: 10 13/16 × 14 7/16 in. (27.5 × 36.6 cm) (irregular)
Classification: Drawings
Credit Line: Purchase, The Elisha Whittelsey Collection, The Elisha Whittelsey Fund, and Jeffrey L. Berenson Gift, 2012
Object Number: 2012.380
Curatorial Department: Drawings and Prints

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Landscape with hills and a lake, William Gilpin British, Pen and black ink, brush and gray wash, on buff paper — Landscape with hills and a lake
William Gilpin
ca. 1772

Observations relative chiefly to Picturesque Beauty, made in the year 1776, on several parts of Great Britain; particularly the High-lands of Scotland

William Gilpin

R. Blamire

1789

Observations relative chiefly to Picturesque Beauty, made in the year 1776, on several parts of Great Britain; particularly the High-lands of Scotland

William Gilpin

R. Blamire

1789

Remarks on forest scenery, and other woodland views, (relative chiefly to picturesque beauty) : Illustrated by the scenes of New-Forest in Hampshire, William Gilpin British — Remarks on forest scenery, and other woodland views, (relative chiefly to picturesque beauty) : Illustrated by the scenes of New-Forest in Hampshire
William Gilpin
R. Blamire
1791

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