Cività Castellana, near Rome

Details

Francis Towne (1740-1816)
Cività Castellana, near Rome
signed, inscribed and dated 'No. 1 Italy/Civetta Castellana/drawn on the spot/by/Francis Towne/August 1st 1781' (on the reverse) and with inscription 'Civitta Castellana, Italy 1st August 1781. Francis Towne delt' (on the artist's washline mount)
pencil, pen and grey and brown ink and watercolour, on the artist's washline mount
6¼ x 8¾ in. (15.7 x 22.2 cm.)

Provenance

Walter Turner.
Viscount Eccles.
with Colnaghi, London.
with Agnew's, London, 1969.
with Spink, London.

Literature

G. Bauer, Le Siècle d'Or de l'Aquarelle Anglaise, Anthèse, 1998, p. 45, pl. 39, illustrated in colour.
W. Hauptman, L'Âge d'Or de l'Aquarelle Anglaise 1770-1900, Lausanne, 1999, p. 50-1, no. 13, illustrated in colour.

Exhibited

London, Colnaghi, Old Master Drawings, June, 1968, no. 59.
London, Spink, Annual Exhibition, 1996, no. 11, illustrated.
Lausanne, Fondation de l'Hermitage, L'Âge d'Or de l'Aquarelle Anglaise 1770-1900, 22 January - 24 May 1999, no. 13.

Special notice

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price plus buyer's premium

Lot Essay

Cività Castellana is twenty miles north of Rome and Towne must have passed through on his journey north having left Rome in late July 1781. He was accompanied by 'Warwick' Smith to Florence, the Italian lakes and then into Switzerland before returning to England. Numbered '1', this drawing is presumably the first of a series of drawings that was started in Italy and finished in Switzerland (see P. Oppé, 'Francis Towne, Landscape Painter', Walpole Society, 1919-20, VIII, p. 116, note 1). By 25 August they had reached Lago Maggiore.
In 1805 two views of Cività Castellana were exhibited in Towne's one-man show at The Gallery, 20 Lower Brook Street, Grosvenor Square, nos. 134 and 135.

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