- Description
-
- Creator
- Francis Towne (1739 - 1816)
- Title(s)
-
- Urnersee
- Lake of Uri
- Date
- ca. 1781/09/05
- Medium
- Pencil, pen and brown and grey inks, grey wash, scratching out
- Dimensions
-
- image width 155mm,
- image length 209mm
- Inscription
-
- sheet, verso
- “Lake of Urie / Septr. 5th. 1781 / Morning light from the left hand / No.48 / Francis Towne”
- in brown ink over pencil up to “hand”, thereafter brown ink only; inscription is upside down in relation to the drawing
- Object Type
- Monochrome wash
-
- Collection
-
- (T08564)
- Catalogue Number
- FT336
- Description Sources
- Examination; Museum records (image)
Provenance
Bequeathed by the artist in 1816 to James White of Exeter (1744–1825), on whose death it passed to Towne’s residuary legatee John Herman Merivale (1779–1844) and his successors. Merivale’s granddaughters Maria Sophia Merivale (1853–1928) and Judith Ann Merivale (1860–1945), both of Oxford, inherited the drawing in May 1915 (BP78). In November 1935 Judith Merivale sold it to Paul Oppé (1878–1957; no.2116) for £15 with five other drawings (a href="/works/ft306">FT306, FT328, FT332, FT336, FT350). His descendants sold it in 1996 with the rest of Oppé’s collection to the present owner, the Tate Gallery (T08564).
- Associated People & Organisations
- Tate, London, 1996, T08564
- Adolph Paul Oppé (1878 - 1957), London, November 1935, GBP 15, no.2116
- Judith Ann Merivale (1860 - 1945), Oxford, May 1915, BP78
- Maria Sophia Merivale (1853 - 1928), Oxford, May 1915, BP78
- John Herman Merivale (1779 - 1844), 1825
- James White (1744 - 1825), Exeter, 1816
- Exhibition History
- 76th Annual Exhibition of Water-Colour Drawings, Thomas Agnew & Sons, 1949, no. 6
- Early English Drawings and Watercolours from the Collection of Paul Oppe Esq., Graves Art Gallery, 1952, no. 71
- Bibliography
- Adrian Bury, Francis Towne - Lone Star of Water-Colour Painting, Charles Skilton: London, 1962, p. 148
- Timothy Wilcox, Francis Towne, Tate Publishing: London, 1997, p. 98
- William Coxe, Travels in Switzerland in a Series of Letters to William Melmouth Esq, T. Cadell: London, 1789, vol 1, pp. 274-276
Other entries in Small Sketchbook: Northern Italy, Switzerland, Savoy and Germany, August and September 1781
A View of a Bridge Fifteen Miles from Florence on the Road to Bologna
Le Rêve at the Head of Lake Como (Lago di Mezzola)
Footnotes
- 1 Coxe 1789, vol.1, pp.274–76.
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Comment
The Urnersee is the lake east of Lucerne and west of Lake Klönthal that for Coxe was “so grand and sublime, that its impression will never be erased from my mind”. Almost certainly Towne’s sketch shows the Tellskapelle: