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Lot Essay
Francis Towne set out to return to England from Rome in late July 1781, having spent a formative year in Italy. The Swiss Alps and Savoy glaciers had become increasingly popular among English travellers during the eighteenth century, becoming thought of as the ultimate example of sublime landscape. By the time Towne travelled through, there were established routes and favoured sights, and in 1779 Revd William Coxe had published an account of his Swiss tours, from which Towne quoted on a drawing of Pantenbruck (R. Stephens, op.cit., FT370).
Towne’s meticulously inscribed and dated drawings give us a reasonable idea of his itinerary, and we know that he crossed the Splügen Pass from Italy into Switzerland on 29 August 1781. He followed the Hinterrhein river to its confluence with the Vorderrhein at Reichenau, which he reached on 30 August. By the morning of 5 September, Towne was at Urnersee, a lake celebrated in the story of William Tell, before spending about a fortnight sketching around Lake Geneva, and up into the mountains around Chamonix and Mont Blanc, where the present drawing was made.
He summited Montanvert, to the north of Mont Blanc, on 16 September, and there are four other known sketches probably made on the same day. Here, he stands looking toward the Mer de Glace from the side of Montanvert. Richard Stephens has suggested that the dramatic, almost floating viewpoint of the drawing may be in part because there was a lower portion to the drawing, now lost. The fingerprints to the lower edges of the sheet suggest that the washes were applied while the sheet was in the sketchbook, on the spot. The extensive annotations are unique in Towne’s oeuvre, and Stephens suggests that they may be attributed to the unfamiliarity of the view. They largely relate to future colours, but also name the peaks, and occasionally describe the terrain. Intriguingly, the inscriptions are in both grey, and Towne’s more usual brown ink. His brown ink inscriptions (predominantly seen on the verso of his sheets) were usually added after the drawing was finished, and it seems likely that the grey here was added at the time of the grey ink outlines, while the brown were added later to the finished drawing.
Towne’s meticulously inscribed and dated drawings give us a reasonable idea of his itinerary, and we know that he crossed the Splügen Pass from Italy into Switzerland on 29 August 1781. He followed the Hinterrhein river to its confluence with the Vorderrhein at Reichenau, which he reached on 30 August. By the morning of 5 September, Towne was at Urnersee, a lake celebrated in the story of William Tell, before spending about a fortnight sketching around Lake Geneva, and up into the mountains around Chamonix and Mont Blanc, where the present drawing was made.
He summited Montanvert, to the north of Mont Blanc, on 16 September, and there are four other known sketches probably made on the same day. Here, he stands looking toward the Mer de Glace from the side of Montanvert. Richard Stephens has suggested that the dramatic, almost floating viewpoint of the drawing may be in part because there was a lower portion to the drawing, now lost. The fingerprints to the lower edges of the sheet suggest that the washes were applied while the sheet was in the sketchbook, on the spot. The extensive annotations are unique in Towne’s oeuvre, and Stephens suggests that they may be attributed to the unfamiliarity of the view. They largely relate to future colours, but also name the peaks, and occasionally describe the terrain. Intriguingly, the inscriptions are in both grey, and Towne’s more usual brown ink. His brown ink inscriptions (predominantly seen on the verso of his sheets) were usually added after the drawing was finished, and it seems likely that the grey here was added at the time of the grey ink outlines, while the brown were added later to the finished drawing.