- Description
-
- Creator(s)
- Thomas Girtin (1775-1802)
- Title
-
- The Beach at Teignmouth
- Date
- (?) 1797
- Medium and Support
- Graphite on wove paper (watermark: J WHATMAN)
- Dimensions
- 16.4 × 27 cm, 6 ½ × 10 ½ in
- Inscription
'Teignmouth' on an old border
- Object Type
- Outline Drawing
- Subject Terms
- Coasts and Shipping; The West Country: Devon and Dorset
-
- Collection
- Catalogue Number
- TG1457
- Girtin & Loshak Number
- 203 as 'Teignmouth'
- Description Source(s)
- Viewed in 2015
Provenance
Henry Peter Standly (1782–1844); his posthumous sale, Christie's, 16 April 1845, lot 397 as 'a sketch in pencil, of Teignmouth'; bought by 'Palser', 8s; J. Palser & Sons; Dr John Percy (1817–89); his posthumous sale, possibly Christie’s, 17 April 1890, lot 505 (one of 9); bought by 'Vokins', £2 2s; J & W Vokins; John Postle Heseltine (1843–1929); his posthumous sale, Sotheby’s, 29 May 1935, lot 313; volume bought by Bernard Squire, £32; bought by Thomas Girtin (1913–94); Sotheby’s, 14 November 1991, lot 109, unsold; his posthumous sale, Sotheby’s, 14 July 1994, lot 107, unsold; Guy Peppiatt Fine Art, 2015; Ewbanks, 25 March 2021, lot 1256, £700
Exhibition History
Guy Peppiatt, London, 2015, no.16
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, from Dartmouth
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
After a stay at Exeter in early November 1797, where Girtin studied views on the river Exe and sketched the city’s medieval monuments, the artist travelled west along the Devon coast, stopping at Teignmouth, twenty kilometres to the south. The old port stands on the north bank of the river Teign, but the focus of Girtin’s view is the town’s growing status as a resort, as we look north along the Promenade with a group of bathing machines on the beach to the right, though the old church of St Michael (which was rebuilt in the nineteenth century) is also visible amongst a group of houses to the left. The drawing was executed at some speed, and one can well imagine that it was taken during a brief break in the journey from Exeter. However, a little later Girtin appears to have gone back to his sketch and worked over it with a sharper piece of graphite to fix the details, and it was possibly at this point that he added a series of notes – ‘w’ for white, ‘b’ for brick and ‘H’ for hut – and it seems that he had a finished watercolour in mind from an early point. Indeed, a small watercolour measuring 10.5 × 14.6 cm (4 ⅛ × 5 3/4 in) was recorded by Thomas Girtin (1874–1960) and David Loshak as being for sale at Leggatt Brothers in 1916, though it was not photographed and there is no way of knowing whether it was based on this drawing (Girtin and Loshak, 1954, p.210). However, it is unlikely that the artist produced more than one drawing of Teignmouth, not least because it also seems to have provided the viewpoint from which he sketched the neighbouring coastal village of Shaldon, an outline that was realised as a more substantial studio work (TG1263).
1797 - 1798
Shaldon, Seen from Teignmouth
TG1263