- Description
-
- Creator(s)
- Thomas Girtin (1775-1802) after (?) Edward Dayes (1763-1804)
- Title
-
- Legburthwaite Vale
- Date
- 1795 - 1796
- Medium and Support
- Graphite and watercolour on laid paper (card)
- Dimensions
- 7.6 × 11.8 cm, 3 × 4 ⅝ in
- Object Type
- Monro School Copy
- Subject Terms
- The Lake District
-
- Collection
- Catalogue Number
- TG0361
- Description Source(s)
- Viewed in 2001 and 2018
Provenance
Edward J. D. Paul; his untraced sale, 27 June 1896; Richard Johnson; his sale, Sotheby’s, 13 June 1934, lot 11 as 'A set of six small water-colour Drawings' by Joseph Mallord William Turner; bought by 'Finberg', £3 10s; Cotswold Gallery, London; bought from them, 1938, as by Edward Dayes
Bibliography
Wilton, 1984a, p.23
Place depicted
Other entries in Topography without Travel:
The British Landscape at Second Hand

Windsor Castle, from the River Thames
Untraced Works

Windsor Castle: The Norman Gateway and the Round Tower, with Part of the Queen's Lodge
Clark Art Institute, Williamstown

The Interior of Tintern Abbey, Showing the Choir and North Transept
Blackburn Museum and Art Gallery

A View in Windsor Great Park with Deer
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

An Ancient House, Possibly in Sussex
Private Collection

The Interior of Tintern Abbey, Looking towards the West Window from the Choir
Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery

The Ruins of Newark Priory Church
Tate, London

Lancaster Castle and Priory Church, Seen with the Old Bridge over the River Lune
Private Collection

Barnard Castle and Bridge, from the River Tees
Tate, London

The Ruined West Front of Dunbrody Abbey Church, County Wexford, Ireland
Tate, London

The Refectory of Walsingham Priory
British Museum, London

The Ruined East End of Walsingham Priory Church
Tate, London

The West Tower of Rumburgh Priory Church
Tate, London

Dumbarton Rock, from the North
Tate, London

Part of the Ruins of Middleham Castle
Tate, London

Kidwelly Church, with the Castle Beyond
Tate, London

Kelso Abbey, from the North West
Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

The Keep, Portchester Castle, from the North East
Tate, London

The Keep of Rochester Castle, from the South East
Tate, London

Part of the Ruins of Middleham Castle
Tate, London

Margam Abbey Church, from the North West
Tate, London

The Ruined East End of Walsingham Priory Church
Tate, London

The Ruins of the Holy Ghost Chapel, Basingstoke
Tate, London

The Medieval Kitchen, Stanton Harcourt
Tate, London

Part of the Ruins of Lewes Castle, from the West
Tate, London

Glasgow High Street, Looking towards the Cathedral
Tate, London

The Keep of Hedingham Castle, from the East
Tate, London

The South Transept, Much Wenlock Priory Church
Tate, London

Newport Castle, Monmouthshire
Private Collection

Portchester Castle, from the Outer Bailey
Tate, London

The Refectory of Walsingham Priory
Tate, London

An Unidentified Church close to a Road
British Museum, London

The Keep of Hedingham Castle, from the South West
Tate, London

Kirkstall Abbey, from the North West
Tate, London

Kirkstall Abbey, from the North West
Tate, London

The Ruined Gateway of Mettingham Castle
Tate, London

The Keep of Rochester Castle, Seen from outside the Walls
Tate, London

Tintern Abbey, from the River Wye
Private Collection

Tintern Abbey: The View from the Nave
Private Collection

The Market at Aberystwyth
Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Lancaster Castle, from the River Lune
Tate, London

Lancaster Castle, from the River Lune
Tate, London

Lancaster Priory Church, Seen with the Old Bridge over the River Lune
Tate, London

Buttermere Bridge, from the Fish Inn
Tate, London

The Medieval Kitchen, Stanton Harcourt
Private Collection, Norfolk

Rochester Cathedral, from the North East, with the Castle Beyond
Tate, London

Glasgow High Street: Looking towards the Cathedral
Tate, London

A Distant View of Corfe Castle
Tate, London

Chichester Cathedral, from the South West
Tate, London

The Gatehouse of Amberley Castle
Tate, London

A Lake and Mountains, Possibly in the Lake District
Tate, London

A Lake and Mountains, Possibly in the Lake District
Tate, London

An Unidentified View across a Lake, or along a Coast
Tate, London

A Road by a Pond, with a Church in the Distance
Tate, London

A Road by a Pond, with a Church in the Distance
British Museum, London

A Church Tower amongst Trees, with a Cart in the Foreground
British Museum, London

An Unidentified Landscape, with a Church amongst Trees
Tate, London

Trees near a Lake or River, at Twilight
Tate, London

A Hilly Landscape, with a Two-Arched Bridge
Private Collection

A Distant View of Tynemouth Priory, from the Sea
Tate, London

An Upland Landscape, Possibly in Northumberland
Private Collection

A Bridge in the Lake District, Possibly Grange Bridge, Borrowdale
Private Collection

Bridgnorth, on the River Severn
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens, San Marino

Knaresborough, from the River Nidd
Private Collection
Revisions & Feedback
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About this Work
This view of Legburthwaite Vale, near Thirlmere in the Lake District, is likely to have been amongst the sixty ‘Coloured Drawings on Cards’ sold from the collection of Dr Thomas Monro (1759–1833) (Christie’s, 7 May 1808, lots 60 and 61; Christie’s, 26 June 1833, lots 80–83). A group of the cards was bought by Girtin’s collaborator at Monro’s home, Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851), and they now form part of the Turner Bequest at Tate Britain. This watercolour was until fairly recently attributed to Edward Dayes (1763–1804), but, as with the majority of the ‘Coloured Drawings’ in the Turner Bequest, it is, as Andrew Wilton has persuasively argued, clearly the work of Girtin (Wilton, 1984a, p.23). The watercolours, all painted on card measuring roughly 3 × 4 ¾ in (7.6 × 12.1 cm), were executed around 1795–96 after a set of outline drawings of subjects that Girtin could not have sketched at first hand and that he copied mainly from the outlines of his first significant patron, the amateur artist and antiquarian James Moore (1762–99). This example, however, is one of a group of landscape views that, though painted in the same format, derive from the sketches of Dayes, who, unlike his one-time apprentice, certainly visited the Lake District and made numerous sketches of its renowned scenery. Some of these were actually used by Girtin as the basis for his earliest watercolours, around 1791–92, including Lake Windermere and Belle Isle (TG0078). Three or four years later, Girtin would no longer have had direct access to Dayes’ studio and his sketches, but Monro owned a significant group of Dayes’ drawings, and in all probability it was these that provided Girtin with subjects from a region that he was never to visit. Monro’s posthumous sale included various lots of Dayes’ ‘Views on the lakes’ that were described as ‘blue and Indian ink sketches’ (Christie’s, 1 July 1833, lot 42), suggesting not only that Girtin’s lake scenes were made in the patron’s home but also that they were from the sketchiest materials rather than fully worked watercolours, as in Legburthwaite Vale (see figure 1). Another view by Dayes of Legburthwaite Vale, formerly in the collection of Arthur Acland Allen (1868–1939) and now probably the work in the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto (60/8), which is in blue and grey wash, may have come from Monro’s collection. This is the sort of sketch that was probably Girtin’s source, albeit at one remove, as he is likely to have produced a pencil outline as an intermediary stage in the process.
It is possible that Monro may have had a publication in mind when he commissioned Girtin to produce small-scale watercolours such as this, but their rapid, even careless execution and sketch-like appearance, suggesting that the work was made on the spot, indicate an altogether different kind of commodity. Indeed, the subjects that were chosen for this informal sketch-like treatment do not follow any obvious pattern, either by geography or building type, that might have made for a thematically unified publication. It may be that there is nothing that unites the group other than that Girtin’s outlines after the sketches of Moore, Dayes and others provided a ready resource from which sketch-like watercolours might be rapidly produced.
1791 - 1792
Lake Windermere and Belle Isle
TG0078