- Museum number
- 1993,0724.3
- Description
-
A sheep farm on the Duddon, Windermere; man in field with dog with farm and hill beyond, sheep to right. 1891
Watercolour with bodycolour; in original frame
- Production date
- 1891
- Dimensions
-
Height: 815 millimetres (frame)
-
Height: 508 millimetres
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Width: 1095 millimetres (frame)
-
Width: 800 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- This watercolour is of a type little-represented in the collection - a last flowering of the nineteenth-century exhibition watercolour, intended to hang framed on walls with oil paintings and to hold their own against them. It was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1891 and sent to the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago two years later, where it was shown in the British section, an example of the nation's achievement in this medium.
In the 1992-3 'Victorian Watercolours' exhibition catalogue, p. 181 Christopher Newall noted that Coutts lived at Ambleside and painted landscapes in the area. Here he depicts an upland farm in the early spring in the valley of the the River Duddon which flows in a southerly direction from the Furness Fells in the Lakes. The specific season is indicated by the dead bracken on the hills and the farmer digging a root crop.
See also C. Newall, 'Victorian Watercolours', 1987, pp.126, 130, pl. 89.
The following label was written by Kim sloan for Places of the Mind, 2017:
'Coutts lived in Windermere, painting locally and in Scotland. Framed in gold and hung in the homes of northern industrialists, magnificent works like this provided windows on the most scenic parts of the national landscape through the seasons. Sent to international exhibitions, like the Chicago World’s Fair where this work won a prize in 1893, they won a reputation for English watercolour through their virtuoso display of the nation’s achievement in this medium.'
See also K. Sloan, 'The 'tormentingly elusive' art of drawing landscape', Places of the Mind: British watercolour landscapes 1850-1950, pp. 24-67.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
1891, London, Royal Academy, no.1314
1893, Chicago, World's Columbian Exposition (Chicago World's Fair)
1992, Sep-Nov, New Haven, YCBA, 'Victorian Landscape Watercolours', no.117
1992/3 Nov-Jan, Cleveland, Museum of Art, 'Victorian Landscape Watercolours', no.117
1993 Feb-Mar, Birmingham, Museum and AG, 'Victorian Landscape Watercolours', no.117
1995-6 Nov-Apr, BM, Recent Acquisitions (no cat.)
2017 23 Feb-27 Aug, London, BM, G90, Places of the Mind: British Landscape watercolours 1850-1950
- Acquisition date
- 1993
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 1993,0724.3
