Wilson Online Reference
Booth Notes Doc. 2
Author
Benjamin Booth
Title/Description
Unpublished Notes, Document 2
Publisher
Unpublished manuscript
Country
London, UK
Printed/Manuscript
Primary unique
Source Institution
Private Collection, England
More Information
A short and incomplete manuscript biography in ink of Wilson by Booth on less than quarto laid paper, Britannia watermarked but undated. The text is ungrammatical in places and lacks some names.
Full Text
Recto: Wilson was designed for a portrait painter his Parents | putting him under [blank] but his Genius great & | original could not bear those fetters & submit to the copying of faces, struck out into Landscape painting, his | first studies were in England under [blank] & painted | Landscapes well before he left it & went to Italy. he there | received Instruction from [blank]. he could not confine | himself to study of Principles - His ardent desire of attaining | the Art and dispelling the clouds that still surrounded him made | his [deleted: indefatigable he] continually study of Nature & observed in | lights & shadows, trying to imitate their striking & brilliant | Effects, so happily shewn in his Landscapes. He followed no | model unless it might be said Claude Lorraine - His art | seemed as ^of\ his own creation [deleted: indebted only to Nature]. His | Designs and Colouring grand and brilliant, ^never stooping to low images or vulgar subjects\. His Clair Obscure ad- | mirable. His Aerial Perspective inimitable. ^His landscapes faithful Scenes from Nature.\ His figures | Easy and expressive - His mythological subjects classically | introduced, wherein He may have followed the Example | of Claude - [deleted: Many of] the works of this charming artist ^stand unrivalled. Many of them\ are in the Cabinets of Princes & Noblemen in England | & other countries & have been Engraved by the first [deleted: Engravers] artists Wilson - over Verso: Wilson was an excellent Classical Scholar, his | father a clergyman being indefatigable in giving | him a good Education under his own Inspection | he being himself a man of learning - I have | often heard Will Parsons the comedian observe (who | was intimately acquainted with Rd Wilson the | Painter) that He never knew but two men who | cou'd quote Passages from Horace extempore, on | any subject mentioned ... & they were Richard | Wilson the Painter & Sam Foote the comedian BB./
Updated by Compiler
2019-07-19 00:00:00