A Sketch of Derwentwater, 1855

Provenance

Estate of the artist

Sale, Thomas E. Kirby & Co., Auctioneers, New York, New York, April 29, 1881, from above

Paul Gifford, acquired from above

Private collection

Exhibited

Hudson River School Visions: The Landscapes of Sanford R. Gifford, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, New York, October 7, 2003–February 8, 2004; Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, March 6–May 16, 2004; National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, June 27–September 26, 2004

Literature

A Memorial Catalogue of the Paintings of Sanford Robinson Gifford, N.A. (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1881), 16, no 76.

Catalogue Part II. of The Gifford Collection, Comprising Balance of the Valuable Paintings, Works of and Belonging to the Estate of the Late Sanford R. Gifford, N.A., April 28–April 29, 1881 (New York: Thomas E. Kirby & Co., Auctioneers, 1881), 19, no. 78.

Hudson River School Visions: The Landscapes of Sanford R. Gifford (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2003), 100-102.

Note

Sanford Robinson Gifford created this work while on a sketching trip in England during his first European tour. One of his patrons, the Reverend T. Stafford Drowne, had requested an image of Derwentwater, a large body of water near Keswick, England. This painting depicts the lake from an overlook known as Friar’s Crag. The artist’s travels are documented through a series of letters, in which he described, “I have never seen so beautiful a combination of mountain, lake, and cultivated vale as there is about the shores of Derwentwater; and I doubt if there be many equal to it in the world.”_[1]

_[1] Hudson River School Visions: The Landscapes of Sanford R. Gifford (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2003), 100.