<< YCBA Home Yale Center for British Art Yale Center for British Art << YCBA Home

YCBA Collections Search

 
IIIF Actions
Creator:
Thomas Gainsborough, 1727–1788
Title:
Wooded Landscape with Country Cart and Figures
Former Title(s):
Bewaldete Landschaft mit Figuren unde einem Landendlichen karren
Date:
between 1785 and 1788
Materials & Techniques:
Black and white chalk, gray wash and black wash on medium, slightly textured, antique buff wove paper prepared with gray
Dimensions:
Sheet: 9 3/4 x 13 inches (24.8 x 33 cm)
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1977.14.4713
Classification:
Drawings & Watercolors
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
cart | genre subject | horse (animal) | laborers | laborers | landscape | trunk
Access:
Accessible by appointment in the Study Room [Request]
Note: The Study Room is open by appointment. Please visit the Study Room page on our website for more details.
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:9640
Export:
XML
IIIF Manifest:
JSON

This is a preparatory drawing for an aquatint, although the only prints to survive from it were made by John Boydell (1720-1804) in 1797, well after Gainsborough's death. Here Gainsborough has allowed the buff-colored paper to act as his midtone then added white chalk and gouache for highlight, and charcoal and dark washes of ink for shadow. Although the surface is characteristically marked with a great richness and variety of textures, the strong tonal contrast between the blackness of the trees and the whiteness of the clouds indicates that it was designed with engraving in mind since it is ideally suited to reproduction as a black-and-white print.

Gallery label for Connections (Yale Center for British Art, 2011-05-26 - 2011-09-11)


Gainsborough’s landscapes frequently depict rustic subjects with rural laborers going about their mundane tasks. To Gainsborough, such subjects embodied the innocence of rural life, uncorrupted by urban manners and morals. But despite his sentimental view of country people, he took their lives and work seriously. This drawing was made at a time when Gainsborough was experimenting with printmaking. The strong tonal contrast between the blackness of the trees and the whiteness of the clouds would have been ideally suited to graphic reproduction; but, if he did complete any prints from this drawing, none is known today. The only surviving aquatints after it were made by John Boydell a decade after Gainsborough’s death.

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)

Connections (Yale Center for British Art, 2011-05-26 - 2011-09-11) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

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) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

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) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

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) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

Thomas Gainsborough (National Gallery of Art, 2003-02-09 - 2003-05-04) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Thomas Gainsborough (Tate Britain, 2002-10-24 - 2003-01-12) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

British Painting and the European Continent (Haus der Kunst Munich, 1979-11-20 - 1980-01-27) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

English Landscape (Paul Mellon Collection) 1630-1850 (Yale Center for British Art, 1977-04-19 - 1977-07-17) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Arts Council of Great Britain, Gainsborough drawings, London, 1960, p. 17, no. 38, NJ18 .G16 H38 (LC) (YCBA) [YCBA]

John Gage, Zwei Jahrhunderte englische Malerei, britische Kunst und Europa 1680 bis 1880 : [Ausstellung] Haus der Kunst Mèunchen, 21. November 1979 bis 27. Januar 1980: [Katalog] , Ausstellungsleitung Haus der Kunst Mèunchen, Mèunchen, 1979, pp. 114-16, no. 59, fig. 59, ND466 Z85 (YCBA) [YCBA]

John T. Hayes, Gainsborough as printmaker, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1972, pp. 92, 97, fig. 81, NJ18 G16 H41+ (YCBA) [YCBA]

John T. Hayes, The drawings of Thomas Gainsborough, The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, New Haven London, 1971, vol. 1, p. 260, no. 661, pl. 195, NJ18 G16 H39 + (YCBA) [YCBA]

Michael Rosenthal, Gainsborough, Tate Publishing, London, 2002, pp. 264-65, no. 163, NJ18 G16 G24 2002 + (YCBA) [YCBA]

The Courtauld Gallery, The William Spooner Collection and Bequest : April to July 1968, The Courtauld Institute Galleries, The Courtauld Gallery, London, 1968, p. 12, no. 28, pl. 6, NC27 .G7 L678 (LC) (YCBA) [YCBA]

Christopher White, English landscape, 1630-1850, drawings, prints & books from the Paul Mellon Collection , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 1977, p. 21, no. 31, fig. LXI, NC228 W45 OVERSIZE (YCBA) [YCBA]

Yale Center for British Art, Great British watercolors : from the Paul Mellon Collection, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2007, pp. 26-27, no. 8, ND1928 .Y35 2007 (LC)+ Oversize (YCBA) [YCBA]


If you have information about this object that may be of assistance please contact us.