THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH (1727-1788) Landscape... Lot 52

THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH (1727-1788) Landscape with farmer, milkmaid and cows in front of a house in the country Canvas 56 x 110 cm Provenance: Lawrie, 1898; acquired from him by R.W.Hudson, 1902; remained in his descendants, Private collection, Monte-Carlo Villa Paloma: -Inventory 1950; -Inventory 1934 Exhibition : Corporation of London Art Gallery, Selection of Works by French and English Painters of the Eighteenth Century, 1902, no. 52 Click here to see our report on the work: https: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=N67cXQzoLUk Bibliography: -Sir Walter Armstrong, Gainsborough and his place in English Art, 1898 p.206, illustrated. P.VII -A.B. Chamberlain, Thomas Gainsborough, 1903, pages.144-145, illustrated.p.51; -Sir Walter Armstrong, Gainsborough, 1904, p.287, illustrated p.16; -William Boulton, Thomas Gainsborough his Life, Works, Friends and Sitters, 1905, pages 48,62; -E.K. Waterhouse, Thomas Gainsborough, 1953, no. 905; -John Hayes, The Landscape Paintigs of Thomas Gainsborough, London, 1982, vol. 2, p. 457, no. 111 (repr. p.458). Hayes dates this painting to about 1772-1774, i.e., at the end of Gainsborough's stay in Bath (1759-1774) and just before his second move to London. It was during this period that he painted some of his finest pure landscapes (Philadelphia Museum of Art; Iveagh Bequest - Kenwood, London; Tate Gallery, London; Cincinnati Art Museum; Yale center for British Art, New Haven). Gainsborough showed a real pleasure in painting landscapes, both as a background to his portraits, which brought him fame and wealth, and as an independent genre. He was one of the first native painters of landscapes of the English countryside. From his early years in London in 1740, he seems to have been recognized as in this field, especially through views of his native Suffolck. By 1748, his talent was already sufficiently noted that William Hogarth commissioned him to paint a small view of the Charterhouse at Foundling Hospital (Thomas Coram Foundation). His descriptions are not strictly topographical, but rather a poetic interpretation of the place with the memory of the Dutch painters of the 17th century, in particular Jacob van Ruisdael, Jan Wijnants in his youth. Then he looks at the works of Albert Cuyp (noticeable here in the way the four cows are grouped or in the detail of the shepherdess milking), Téniers, and Claude Lorrain. The influence of Dutch realism gave way, in the following years, to the more dramatic and imaginative landscapes of Peter Paul Rubens, through a light palette and a freer, lighter touch, a stylistic path that recalls that of the landscape painter Fragonard, a few years later. But the style here is very much that of the 18th century, "rocaille", more sketchy, with a dynamic composition divided by an ascending diagonal: on the right a large silvery sky, all in vibrations while the animals, the two figures and the house (cottage) are concentrated at the bottom and on the left side. Gainsborough's subtlety and intelligence ensure that this oblique line is not strict, slightly offset by the tree trunk, and broken by both the descending slope of the thatched roof and the verticality of the boy carrying the buckets of milk. Video youtube : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N67cXQzoLUk Landscape with farmer, milkmaid, and cows before a Country home Canvas 56 x 110 cm Provenance: Lawrie, 1898; acquired by the latter from R.W. Hudson, 1902; through descent, private collection, Monte-Carlo Exhibit: Corporation of London Art Gallery, Selection of Works by French and English Painters of the Eighteenth Century, 1902, no. 5 Bibliography: -Sir Walter Armstrong, Gainsborough and his place in English Art, 1898 p.206, illustrated. P.VII -A.B. Chamberlain, Thomas Gainsborough, 1903, pages.144-145, illustrated.p.51; -Sir Walter Armstrong, Gainsborough, 1904, p.287, illustrated p.16; -William Boulton, Thomas Gainsborough his Life, Works, Friends and Sitters, 1905