This view of the great tithe barn at Abbotsbury is one of two versions of a composition (the other being TG1699) that were worked up in the studio from a colour sketch (TG1244) that Girtin executed on his West Country tour in the autumn of 1797. The artist is documented as having been in Exeter in early November, and it seems that his visit there to sketch an interior view of the cathedral was preceded by a journey along the Dorset coast that took in Weymouth and Lyme Regis, as well as Abbotsbury, where he produced another on-the-spot colour study of the early fifteenth-century tithe barn (TG1247) (Chancery, Income and Expenses, 1804).¹ The fact that Girtin coloured two views of the barn suggests that he had a commission for a finished watercolour when he visited, and the size of this version of the composition, in comparison to the more sketch-like view in the collection of Leeds City Art Gallery (TG1246), may indicate that this work was it. If this was the case, it is also possible that another watercolour (TG1699), which seems to have been abandoned unfinished, preceded this work. The notion that Girtin visited Abbotsbury to prepare for a commission makes particular sense, since the artist had already depicted the tithe barn in a watercolour made for the antiquarian and amateur artist James Moore (1762–99) (TG0146) from one of his on-the-spot sketches (see source image TG0146). The point is that Girtin may have had the basic outlines of the barn and its location to hand, but the specific details, particularly the weathered building materials of thatch and stone, required a first hand record. Moore’s earlier order for a small-scale architectural record of the only remaining part of the Benedictine abbey might have been safely delivered from an outline drawing, but a larger commission of the picturesque ensemble required something more detailed.

The more formal character of this view of the tithe barn at Abbotsbury, which led me to suspect that it was a commission, is made clearer by comparing it with the smaller version (TG1246). Unlike that more sketch-like work, which adopts the same close-up view seen in the on-the-spot drawing, and which likewise cuts the barn to the right, this watercolour includes part of the landscape looking to the distance, so that the building itself loses some of the sense of monumentality that is such a feature of the smaller view. The male figure, shown threshing corn, is more active than the older contemplative man included in the other work, and he, together with the wider range of animals and the landscape context, suggests that the barn is an integral part of a modern working farm. The work still records something of the ‘former grandeur’ of what one contemporary guidebook referred to as a truly ‘noble edifice’, but it is now closer to the genre-inflected views of picturesque vernacular buildings that formed an increasing part of Girtin’s output after the 1797 tour (Love, 1788, p.21). Like this work, many of those watercolours have faded badly. Whilst this does not detract from the impact of more monumental compositions, such as the extraordinary A Mill in Essex (TG1416), the depiction of the subtle modulations of light across the varied materials employed in the construction of the tithe barn depends too much on the tones that have been lost for the overall effect of the work not to be severely compromised. Such is the level of fading in this work that it is not even clear whether the artist ever painted in the sky.

1800 - 1801

A Distant View of Guisborough Priory; The Tithe Barn, Abbotsbury

TG1699

(?) 1797

The Tithe Barn, Abbotsbury

TG1244

(?) 1797

Abbotsbury: The Tithe Barn, with a Pond

TG1247

1797 - 1798

The Tithe Barn, Abbotsbury

TG1246

1800 - 1801

A Distant View of Guisborough Priory; The Tithe Barn, Abbotsbury

TG1699

1792 - 1793

The Tithe Barn at Abbotsbury, with St Catherine’s Chapel on the Hill

TG0146

1792 - 1793

The Tithe Barn at Abbotsbury, with St Catherine’s Chapel on the Hill

TG0146

1797 - 1798

The Tithe Barn, Abbotsbury

TG1246

(?) 1799

A Mill in Essex

TG1416