- Description
-
- Creator
- Francis Towne (1739 - 1816)
- Title(s)
-
- Monte Porzio Catone from the Park of the Villa Mondragone at Frascati
- Monte Porzio from the Villa Mondragone, Frascati
- Date
- 1781
- Medium
- Pencil, pen and black ink, watercolour
- Dimensions
-
- image width 386mm,
- image length 498mm
- Mount
- mounted by the artist, the mount watermarked with a fleur de lis design dated "1788"
- Inscription
-
- artist's mount, verso
- “No56 / Monta Porzia, from the park of the Villa Dragona at Frescati, / The Morning light coming over the Tivoli mountains, / Drawn & tinted on the Spot, by Francis Towne / 1781[in dark brown ink over scratching out]”
- Object Type
- Watercolour
-
- Collection
-
- (Nn,1.25)
- Catalogue Number
- FT286
- Description Sources
- Examination; Wilcox 1997 (image)
Provenance
Bequeathed by the artist in 1816 to James White of Exeter (1744–1825), who gave it in 1816 to the present owner, the British Museum (Nn.1.25).
- Associated People & Organisations
- British Museum, London, 1816, Nn.1.25
- James White (1744 - 1825), Exeter, 1816
- Exhibition History
- [?] Exhibition of Original Drawings at the Gallery, No.20 Lower Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, 20 Lower Brook Street, 1805, no. 150 as 'Monte Porzia, with the morning sun rising over the Sabine mountains, from the Villa Dragone at Frascati'
- Francis Towne, Tate Gallery; Leeds City Art Gallery, 24 June 1997 - 4 January 1998, no. 33
- Light, time, legacy: Francis Towne’s watercolours of Rome, British Museum, 2016
- Bibliography
- Paul Oppé, 'Francis Towne, Landscape Painter', The Walpole Society: London, 1920, p. 112
- Timothy Wilcox, Francis Towne, Tate Publishing: London, 1997, pp. 17, 86
Other entries in Italy Series, April to June 1781
Francis Towne
Thirteen Miles on the Road from Rome to Tivoli
Thirteen Miles on the Road from Rome to Tivoli
Francis Towne
A View of Rocca di Papa with Part of the Convent
A View of Rocca di Papa with Part of the Convent
Francis Towne
A View of the Spot where Hannibal is said to have looked at Rome
A View of the Spot where Hannibal is said to have looked at Rome
Francis Towne
A View of the Spot from which Hannibal is said to have looked at Rome
A View of the Spot from which Hannibal is said to have looked at Rome
Francis Towne
Monte Porzio Catone from the Park of the Villa Mondragone at Frascati
Monte Porzio Catone from the Park of the Villa Mondragone at Frascati
Francis Towne
Blasted Pine Tree in the Villa Mondragone, Frascati
Blasted Pine Tree in the Villa Mondragone, Frascati
Footnotes
- 1 Wilcox 1997, p.86.
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Comment
This early-morning view looks towards Monte Porzio Catone, a nearby ancient hilltop town developed by the Borghese family, who built the church of S. Gregorio Magno visible in Towne’s drawing.
Wilcox suggested that Towne’s work at Frascati shows his awareness of the tradition that Gaspar Dughet had a home there for the purposes of making early morning studies.1 He also pointed out the uniqueness of this work in being the only one known that Towne recorded as having been both drawn and coloured on the spot, noting also that the paper’s great absorbency made this viable.