Syon House from Richmond Gardens - I

Syon House from Richmond Gardens - I
Syon House from Richmond Gardens - I
Syon House from Richmond Gardens - I
Private Collection England / Photograph by Matthew Hollow
title=Credit line
Artist
Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)
Title
Syon House from Richmond Gardens - I
Date
Early 1760s
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
Metric: 73.6 x 105.6 cm sight size framed
Imperial: 28 15/16 x 41 9/16 in. sight size framed
Collection
Private Collection, England
Wilson Online Reference
P88C
Description
Syon House appears on the right, seen from old Richmond Gardens, Kew across the River Thames. In the distance is the church of All Saints, Isleworth. The whole scene is bathed in a serene Claudean afternoon light. Under the trees in the right hand corner, an artist is drawing on white paper while an elegant man stands nearby. To their right is a gardener seated on his wheelbarrow, his blue coat hanging over a roller. Behind him the mast of a boat is visible, and further along the bank a group of figures strain at its towing-rope. Beyond to the left, groups of figures promenade or sit on the ground. In the background William Kent's follies built for the late Queen Caroline are visible - the Hermitage (begun 1730) and beyond the bend, the domed circular Tuscan Temple. Birds fly distantly overhead.
Exhibited
RA 1872 (58 - lent Cavendish-Bentinck); Arthur Tooth & Sons, London, 1949; London, Somerset House 1977, London and the Thames: Paintings of Three Centuries (33)
Provenance
George Augustus Frederick Cavendish-Bentinck (1821-1891), 3 Grafton Street, London W.1 and Brownsea Island; Christie's 8 July 1891 (541) bt Vokins; Mrs Arthur James, 3 Grafton Street, London W.1 and Coton House, Rugby; Christie's 15 October 1948 (134 - A View of Sion House, Brentford, from the River at Kew); with Thomas Agnew & Sons, London; with Arthur Tooth & Sons, London; bt Kenneth Lindsey c.1951; thence by descent
Techniques and materials
The figures have a rococo, Canalettesque appearance and are broadly painted, as is the foliage of the overhanging lighter tree at the right.
Verso inscriptions
Lining canvas inscribed: 'Cleaned, lined and repaired by AR Burt Chester 1837'.
Subject
Syon House, situated on the banks of the Thames near Brentford, had been in the possession of the Percy family since 1604. The Earl of Northumberland (created duke in October 1766) embarked on a scheme of fitting up the apartments in the grandest classical manner in 1762. This refurbishment, not fully realised, took seven years, during which time the park surrounding the house was refashioned by Lancelot 'Capability' Brown. Robert Adam's designs for the remodelling of the interior were published as vol. 1 of his Works in Architecture in 1773. However, there is no evidence of any ducal patronage of Wilson and this scene was probably intended as generic rather than as the portrait of a private estate.
Related Drawings
D347 View of a Country House and Lake, The Courtauld Gallery, London
Related Prints
E72/13 Thomas Hastings after Wilson, Sion Park and House on Thames from Richmond Gardens, The British Museum (1854,0708.70) and other impressions
Versions
See 'Links' tab
Related Works by Other Artists
[1] George Lambert View of Copped Hall in Essex, from the Park, 1746, Tate, London
[2] Antonio Canaletto, Syon House, 1749, Northumberland Collection
[3] John Boydell. A View of Sion House looking towards Kew, 1753, coloured engraving, Orleans House Gallery and other impressions
[4] Thomas Hastings, One of the Great Ponds between Hampstead and Highgate, London, looking towards the Surrey Hills, 1831, Bank of England, London (1141)
Critical commentary
Wilson produced a number of views of country houses following his return to England from Italy in 1757. The extent to which Syon House is diminished in comparison with the landscape as a whole demonstrates his compositional development of the formulae of predecessors such as George Lambert.
Bibliography
WGC, pp.184-85, pl. 54a (version 2); J. Harris, The Artist and the Country House, 1979, p. 272. fig. 294
More Information
In the early 1760s Wilson painted numerous English scenes, especially of the Thames Valley. Because of its long-standing connection with royalty and more recent association with literary figures, including James Thomson, Alexander Pope and other leading poets, the area round Syon, Richmond and Twickenham had acquired a reputation as England's 'classic ground', redolent of history and high culture. Private estates near London, like Syon, were frequently compared with the villa-retreats of the ancient Romans.
Re 'Verso inscriptions' above: Albin Roberts Burt (1783-1842) was a portrait and miniature painter, print engraver and publisher as well as a picture restorer. He later moved from Chester to Clerkenwell in London.
Condition/Conservation
Framed in a nineteenth-century composition Maratta frame. W.G. Constable recorded it as 'rubbed and perhaps unfinished' though neither was obvious in 2014.
Kate Lowry has noted: Original support simple weave, medium weight, linen canvas. Paste lined onto similar weight linen canvas by A.R. Burt who inscribed the lining reverse: 'Cleaned, lined and repaired by AR Burt Chester 1837'. Original turnovers removed at the time of relining. Four-member stretcher without keys probably dates from relining. The vection cracks run along the inside edges of the present stretcher bars except at the top edge where the distance between the top of the stretcher bar and the crack is 25 mm narrower. This suggests that the size of the original canvas has been reduced slightly along the top when relined. Dark grey ground, probably commercially prepared. The half tones of the flesh are the exposed grey of the ground. The painting has recently been cleaned and under UV light residues of old varnish are visible around margins.
Updated by Compiler
2021-04-27 00:00:00