- Description
-
- Creator(s)
- Thomas Girtin (1775-1802)
- Title
-
- Malmesbury Market Cross
- Date
- (?) 1797
- Medium and Support
- Graphite on wove paper
- Dimensions
- 25.5 × 33.5 cm, 10 × 13 ¼ in
- Inscription
‘Malmesbury’ lower left, by (?) Thomas Girtin
- Object Type
- Outline Drawing
- Subject Terms
- Gothic Architecture: Domestic Buildings; The Village; Wiltshire View
-
- Collection
- Catalogue Number
- TG1291
- Girtin & Loshak Number
- 211
- Description Source(s)
- Auction Catalogue
Provenance
Squire Gallery, London, 1938; Pierre Jeannerat (1896–1967); Sotheby’s, 15 March 1984, lot 39, £1,045; Spink & Son Ltd, London
Exhibition History
Squire Gallery, 1938a, no.40; Spink’s, London, 1985, no.3
Place depicted
Other entries in The 1797 West Country Tour:
Sketches and Subsequent Watercolours
The Ruined Chancel, Netley Abbey
The Whitworth, The University of Manchester
The Gateway of the Bishop's Palace, Wells
Fitzwilliam Museum, University of Cambridge
A Distant View of Southampton
Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Providence
Bursledon Ferry on the River Hamble, near Southampton
Private Collection
The Hamble River, near Southampton
Private Collection
A Cliff-Top View, Probably on the Coast of Dorset
Leeds Art Gallery
The Market Rooms, Weymouth
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens, San Marino
An Old Bridge, Possibly near Abbotsbury
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
An Old Bridge, Possibly near Abbotsbury
Private Collection
The Tithe Barn, Abbotsbury
The Whitworth, The University of Manchester
Abbotsbury: The Tithe Barn, with a Pond
Leeds Art Gallery
Abbotsbury: The Tithe Barn, with a Pond
Private Collection
The Coast of Dorset, with Lyme Regis Below
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
The Coast of Dorset, with Lyme Regis Below
Private Collection
A Panoramic View near Lyme Regis
National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa
Above Lyme Regis, Looking across Marshwood Vale
Harvard Art Museums / Fogg Museum
The Interior of Exeter Cathedral, Looking from the Nave
Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery, Exeter
Exeter, from Trew’s Weir
Royal Albert Memorial Museum and Art Gallery, Exeter
Exeter Cathedral, from the South
Koriyama City Museum of Art
On the River Exe, Exeter
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Shaldon, Seen from Teignmouth
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Kingswear, from Dartmouth
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Kingswear on the River Dart
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Sharpham House on the River Dart
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
The Marine Barracks at Stonehouse, Plymouth
Private Collection
Okehampton Castle, from the West Okement River
Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto
Cattle by a River with a Castle Beyond, Probably Okehampton Castle
Private Collection
The Estuary of the River Taw
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Wells Cathedral, from the Moat of the Bishop's Palace
Private Collection
St Vincent's Rocks from Nightingale Valley, near Bristol
Private Collection
Bristol Cathedral, from College Green
National Gallery of Art, Washington
Bristol: St Mary Redcliffe, from the Harbour
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Bristol Harbour and St Mary Redcliffe
Bristol Museum & Art Gallery
A Wharf with Shipping, Possibly at Bristol
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Ships in a Harbour, Possibly at Bristol
Harewood House, Yorkshire
An Unidentified Estuary, Probably in the West Country
Tate, London
An Unidentified Landscape, Possibly a West-Country Tor
Tate, London
The Marine Barracks at Stonehouse, Plymouth
Private Collection
A House Reflected in the Waters of an Estuary
Rhode Island School of Design Museum, Providence
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About this Work
The discovery during the preparation of this online catalogue that Girtin’s other drawing of the elaborately carved late fifteenth-century market cross in Malmesbury was copied from the work of another artist (TG1292), and that he therefore did not sketch it on the spot on the return from his trip to the West Country in 1797, has inevitably led to questions about the status of this work too. This different view of the octagonal cross, looking north west to the spire of St Paul’s Church, was ascribed by Thomas Girtin (1874–1960) and David Loshak to the 1797 journey and, although I have only had access to a black and white photograph of the drawing, it does indeed appear to have a strong claim to be an on-the-spot sketch. This particular view, with the ornate central lantern balanced by the steeple to the right, and the sundial visible in the centre, was the subject of a number of prints and drawings, but I have not been able to locate any example dating from earlier than 1809. Although that does not mean that Girtin did not work from an untraced drawing by his master, Edward Dayes (1763–1804), or his early patron James Moore (1762–99), I suspect in this case that Girtin did make the sketch on the spot in 1797. One detail not noted in any of the other images I have found, which might substantiate this, is the easily overlooked fingerpost in the centre of the composition. This is the sort of detail that is likely to be missed out in a copy, but it might have caught the attention of an artist working on site.
1795 - 1796
Malmesbury: The Market Cross
TG1292