Thomas Gainsborough, R.A. (Sudbury, Suffolk 1727-1788 London)

Study of a donkey laden with panniers and accompanying figure

Details

Thomas Gainsborough, R.A. (Sudbury, Suffolk 1727-1788 London)
Study of a donkey laden with panniers and accompanying figure
stamped 'T Gainsborough' (lower centre) and stamped 'T Gainsborough' and 'Gainsborough' (upper centre, both overmounted) and indistinctly inscribed 'Very....' (along the lower edge)
pencil, fragmentary watermark
5 ¾ x 7 3/8 in. (14.6 x 18.8 cm.)

Provenance

Anonymous sale; Christie's, London, 5 March 1974, lot 49 (130 gns to Hope).
Anonymous sale; Christie's, 5 November 1974, lot 40 (55 gns to Boyce).
Anonymous sale; Sotheby's, London, 18 November 1976, lot 193.

Literature

J. Hayes, 'Gainsborough Drawings: A Supplement to the Catalogue Raisonné, Master Drawings, XXI, no. 4, 1983, p. 391, no. 985.
S. Sloman, 'The Holloway Gainsborough: its subject re-examined’, Gainsborough’s House Review 1997/98, pp. 50-51, fig. 3.

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Lot Essay

For further information about the first of these artist's stamps, see Hayes, The Drawings of Thomas Gainsborough, 1970, vol. I, pp. 25-6. The present drawing would have been drawn from life, Hayes relates the technique to Peasant on Horseback (British Museum), op. cit., no. 819, pl. 36 and dates it to the early to mid 1750s.

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