View near the Loggerheads…

View near the Loggerheads…
View near the Loggerheads…
View near the Loggerheads…
Tate, London 2014
title=Credit line
Artist
Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)
Title
View near the Loggerheads, Denbighshire (A Welsh Valley with a Quarry) (Hills and a Quarry)
Date
c.1765-70 (undated)
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
Metric: 41.9 x 52.1 cm
Imperial: 16 1/2 x 20 1/2 in.
Accession Number
N02989
Wilson Online Reference
P155
Description
The view is taken from a point close to Colomendy Hall, near Llanferres, Denbighshire where Wilson's cousin, Catherine Jones, lived and where he stayed regularly, dying there in 1782. The prospect is north-west towards the River Alun, which runs beneath some distinctive cliffs. In the 18th century these were known as Pen y Carreg Wen (Head of the White Rock).
Exhibited
London 1925 (8 - Landscape with Quarry); Manchester 1925 (38 - Landscape with Quarry); London, Cardiff and New Haven, 1982-83 (122)
Provenance
The artist until 1782; Catherine Jones [...] bequeathed by Richard and Catherine Garnons to the National Gallery 1854; transferred to the Tate Gallery
Signature/inscription
Unsigned; no inscription
Techniques and materials
Linen canvas, relined; 14 threads per cm. White, uniform, general ground. Anne Baxter has noted: A size layer was found between two layers of pigmented priming - also found on all the paintings examined from the 1760s and 1770s. The sky pigment is Prussian blue. It has a complete underpainting of bright yellow pigment, visible between the branches of the left hand tree.
Labels
[1] Bourlet label on vertical crossmember of stretcher: B18387
Subject
This unfinished Welsh landscape is unusual for Wilson in showing a place with family associations. It is also one of many instances where he applies the lessons learned in the Roman Campagna, filled with ancient ruins, to the scenery of his native country.
Related Drawings
D363 A Welsh Valley, Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford
Critical commentary
As with most of Wilson's other pictures, an intellectual process of idealisation prevents an overt emotional response. The incomplete state of the picture makes it difficult to determine its precise date but it is probably contemporary with other Welsh views of the mid-1760s.
Bibliography
WGC, p. 178, pl. 40b (as Hills and a Quarry); Herrmann 1973, pl. 48A, p. 56; Solkin 1982, pp. 229-30; Pugh 2013, pp. 40-41, pl. 1.5
More Information
Out of sight, in a dip in the middle ground, lies the Loggerheads Inn, whose sign is traditionally held to have been painted by Wilson.
Condition/Conservation
Visual examination and sampling by Ann Baxter 1982. Dimensions with frame: 63.5 x 71 cm. Kate Lowry has noted:
The sky appears finished, with calm flat clouds. Pink at horizon where dragged down to the outline of hills. However the foreground is unfinished and sketchy with the warm mushroom coloured priming visible throughout. Some detail in right hand rocks of middle ground. Some reserve left for tree branches at left against the sky and for tree trunks against the landscape. Standing figure in the foreground has pentiment to head.