This view of the imposing ruined interior of the priory church at Lanercost, seen from the south transept, was copied from an engraving (see the source image above) that in turn was taken from a watercolour by Thomas Hearne (1744–1817), and it therefore shows a scene in Cumbria that Girtin was never to visit. The watercolour was commissioned by one of Girtin’s most important early patrons, the amateur artist and collector John Henderson (1764–1843), and the engraving on which the watercolour is based was presumably also from his collection. Henderson commissioned three other watercolour copies after engravings from Hearne’s outstanding collection of antiquarian subjects, Antiquities of Great-Britain (Hearne, 1786–1807), including the views Ripon Minster, from the River Skell (TG0865), Melrose Abbey: The View to the South Transept (TG0868) and The Gatehouse, Bury St Edmunds Abbey (TG0866). Together, the drawings form a distinctive and coherent group, with each copy measuring the same size as its model and the two horizontal compositions balancing the two in a vertical format. Henderson’s patronage of Girtin largely took the form of commissioning watercolours from works that he only owned as prints or outline drawings and sketches, and in this respect it resembled the labours that the young artist undertook with his contemporary Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851) at the home of his other great patron of the mid-1790s, Dr Thomas Monro (1759–1833). The emphasis was placed squarely on the production in bulk of faithful, if unimaginative, versions of the original material, and this watercolour is typical in following its model very closely, down to the inclusion of the same standing figure. The four watercolours produced after Hearne’s prints are all in the collection of the British Museum as a result of the bequest of Henderson’s son, and it is consequently possible to place the drawings next to each other and appreciate the degree of unity across the group. Each employs the same simple palette of colours laid over a uniform tone of grey for the shadows, and it is easy to imagine Girtin working on all four simultaneously, adding the same tone to each of the drawings in turn.

None of the numerous copies produced by Girtin for Henderson are dated, but they generally seem to have been made around 1795–96. The small scale of the watercolours made after the Hearne prints, together with their limited palette and the retention of a number of stylistic features that originated in Girtin’s work as an apprentice to Edward Dayes (1763–1804), suggests that they were amongst the earliest works made for Henderson, and they noticeably lack the sophisticated use of line that marks many of the later commissions. Likewise, Girtin’s perspective at this date leaves something to be desired and the figure, which in Hearne’s print carries a weighty moral significance, as David Morris has demonstrated in his exemplary book on the artist, here gives no more than a sense of scale to the ruins (Morris, 1989, pp.44–48). Thus, although the production of watercolour copies of engravings might be thought to have been little more than hack work for a talented young artist, the earlier date of their production suggests that Girtin still had something to learn from copying Hearne’s compositions. Hearne was after all the most adept of the older generation of topographical artists at producing images that balanced the needs of the antiquarian market with the desires of customers whose interest tended more towards landscape watercolours. It is not surprising to see, therefore, that when Girtin came to depict interior views of the great monastic ruins he encountered on his travels in northern England and the Scottish Borders, he chose viewpoints that owed something to Hearne’s example, as in his depiction of the crossing at Fountains Abbey (TG1508b).

(?) 1795

Ripon Minster, from the River Skell

TG0865

(?) 1795

Melrose Abbey: The View to the South Transept

TG0868

(?) 1795

The Gatehouse, Bury St Edmunds Abbey

TG0866

1798 - 1799

An Interior View of Fountains Abbey: The East Window from the Presbytery

TG1508b