Lot Essay
In the early nineteenth century the practice of painting landscapes in oils directly from nature moved from the margins of artistic activity to become a central practice of many of the progressive young artists in Europe. These sketches had an important role. On one level they were a way of studying and recording different aspects of nature in a wide variety of climatic conditions. On another, they were a means of training the hand to describe in oil paintings on paper the effects of light and color on form. They were also a means of teaching the painter how to select and compose a coherent pictorial image from the multitude of choices offered by nature. One of the main (and most influential) exponents of this practice, Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes (1750-1818) actively encouraged his students to employ this practice in their formal training. In 1800 he wrote a widely read two volume treatise, Elmens de perspective pratique, in which he stressed the importance of painting immediately observed and spontaneously executed studies as a stage in the larger process of an artist's education and as a step towards the execution of a finished exhibition painting (see P. Conisbee, in the catalogue of the exhibition In the Light of Italy: Corot and Early Open-Air Painting, Washington, The National Gallery of Art, May 26-Sept. 2, 1996).