- Description
-
- Creator(s)
- Unknown Artist
- Title
-
- The Head of Ullswater, from Goborrow Park
- Date
- 1800 - 1805
- Medium and Support
- Watercolour on laid paper
- Dimensions
- 21 × 33.5 cm, 8 ¼ × 13 ¼ in
- Object Type
- Formerly attributed to Thomas Girtin
- Subject Terms
- Lake Scenery; The Lake District
-
- Collection
- Catalogue Number
- TG0206
- Description Source(s)
- Auction Catalogue
Provenance
Lt. William R. Burn, Carrycoats Hall, Northumberland; then by descent; Anderson & Garland, 20 July 2023, lot 1002, £750
Place depicted
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An Icelandic Woman in Her Riding Dress
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The Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg
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Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
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An English Nobleman in 1559
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Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
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Brown University Library, Providence, Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection
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British Museum, London
'Third Regiment of Foot Guards, 1660': Grenadier and Private
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Brown University Library, Providence, Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection
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Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford
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Westminster Abbey and Bridge, from Lambeth
Private Collection
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Rochester Cathedral and Castle, from the North East
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Worcester, from the River Severn
Indianapolis Museum of Art at Newfields
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Wordsworth Grasmere (Dove Cottage and Wordsworth Museum)
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Private Collection
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Hereford Museum and Art Gallery
Chepstow Castle, on the River Wye
Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Warehouse and Shipping at Wapping
Leicester Museum & Art Gallery
A Distant View of Hereford Cathedral
Private Collection
The Gatehouse and Barbican, Warwick Castle
Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco
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Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford
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Private Collection
The Head of Ullswater, from Goborrow Park
Private Collection
Part of the Ruins of Roche Abbey
Private Collection
The Transept of St Saviour’s, Southwark
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Part of the Ruins of the Savoy Palace, Westminster Bridge Beyond
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
Durham Cathedral, from the River Wear
Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne
All Saints' Church, Marlow
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About this Work
This view of Ullswater in the Lake District was until recently known only from an old photograph and the attribution to Girtin was consequently left with a question mark. Girtin did not travel to the Lake District, but he did produce a watercolour of Ullswater that was sold at an auction at Greenwood’s in London in 1791 (Exhibitions: Greenwood, 17 November 1791, lot 50), having been consigned to the sale by Girtin’s master, Edward Dayes (1763–1804). It is just possible, therefore, that this work was produced by Girtin as an apprentice from a composition by Dayes and that it belonged with a group of Lake District scenes that he produced around 1791–92, including The View from the Great Boathouse, Lake Windermere (TG0073) and Lake Windermere and Belle Isle (TG0078). However, the procurement of a colour image has confirmed my initial suspicion that the association of the watercolour with Girtin was a case of wishful thinking during an earlier period when any brooding lake view attracted a speculative attribution to the artist, and this was no doubt encouraged by the fact that Thomas Girtin (1874–1960) and David Loshak mistakenly argued that the artist journeyed to the region on two occasions (Girtin and Loshak, 1954, pp.41–42). The watercolour certainly appears to date from about the right time, but although it bears some resemblance to Girtin’s view of Dovedale (TG1751), the formless structure of the similar rock to the left, combined with a poor command of aerial perspective, a random distribution of light, and a perfunctory and formulaic skyscape, all point to the work of an unknown amateur artist, albeit one who knew something about the professional artist’s later style and his use of a rough-textured laid paper.
1791 - 1792
The View from the Great Boathouse, Lake Windermere
TG0073
1791 - 1792
Lake Windermere and Belle Isle
TG0078
1800 - 1801
Dovedale
TG1751