Currently not on view
A View Overlooking the Thames at Richmond,
ca. 1826
Cornelius Varley, 1781–1873; born and died London, England
2005-104
This drawing is a rare unfinished work by Cornelius Varley, a founding member of the Society of Painters in Water-Colours, an institution formed in 1805 to promote the medium as a uniquely British rival to oil painting. According to the art historian Timothy Wilcox, sketches and detailed scientific drawings by Varley have survived, yet all of his fully realized exhibition watercolors are now lost. This uncompleted sheet is the only example of his intentions to create idealized interpretations of actual English views. The panorama of the River Thames as seen from the heights of Richmond Hill, once described by Sir Walter Scott as "an unrivaled landscape," was often immortalized by British poets and painters in the nineteenth century.
More About This Object
Information
Title
A View Overlooking the Thames at Richmond
Dates
ca. 1826
Maker
Medium
Watercolor over graphite
Dimensions
52 x 73.5 cm (20 1/2 x 28 15/16 in.)
frame: 86 x 111.5 x 3.1 cm (33 7/8 x 43 7/8 x 1 1/4 in.)
Credit Line
Museum purchase, Surdna Fund
Object Number
2005-104
Place Depicted
England, Richmond upon Thames, London
Culture
Type
Materials
Christie's, London 1875, lot 13, Cornelius Varley Estate sale. (per dealer); London, Sotheby's, Nov. 14, 1991, lot 168 (See reference Bib. 5238); Lowell Libson, London.;
- Sotheby Parke Bernet & Co. 1979. Important eighteenth and nineteenth century British drawings and watercolours: including a collection of drawings by Benjamin West, P.R.A. ..., sale code ASTER. 22 March 1979, London., lot 168
- Timothy Wilcox, et. al., Cornelius Varley: the art of observation, (London: Lowell Libson Ltd, 2005). , cat. no. 67 (illus.); pp. 52-53
- "Acquisitions of the Princeton University Art Museum 2005," Record of the Princeton University Art Museum 65 (2006): p. 49-81., p. 53; p. 55 (illus.)
- Timothy Wilcox, "English Watercolors of the River Thames by David Cox and Cornelius Varley," Record of the Princeton University Art Museum 66 (2007): p. 20-29., p. 20, fig. 1
