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    Gypsies on a Road near Rome

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    Gypsies on a Road near Rome
    Gypsies on a Road near Rome
    Gypsies on a Road near Rome
    Private Collection, England / Photograph by John Hammond
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    Artist
    Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)
    Title
    Gypsies on a Road near Rome
    Date
    1771?
    Medium
    Oil on canvas
    Dimensions
    Metric: 33 x 43.1 cm
    Imperial: 13 x 17 in.
    Collection
    Private Collection, England
    Accession Number
    BB29
    Wilson Online Reference
    P176
    Description
    View from a wooded hill across a plain with a winding river towards distant mountains, with two gypsy women standing under a tree in the left foreground, a man seated at the centre and another nearby on the slope
    Exhibited
    RA 1779 (353 - a version); Grosvenor Gallery 1888 (339); Brighton 1920 (33 - The Gipsies - View near Albano); Exeter 1946 (71); Birmingham 1948-49 (28); London 1949 (27); London 1968 (18); London, Cardiff and New Haven, 1982-83 (138); Conwy 2009 (25); Weston 2011 (25); Gainsborough House 2014 (unnumbered)
    Provenance
    Paul Sandby; Benjamin Booth; thence by descent
    Signature/inscription
    [1] Signed with monogram in right foreground: RW [the R reversed]
    [2] Inscribed on milestone lower left: XV | DA | ROMA
    [3] Dated on milestone: 1771 [?]
    Subject
    The identification of the location as Italian derives principally from the inscription on the milestone. Otherwise the scene is more generic, with debts to Aelbert Cuyp and other Netherlandish artists, rather than to the Italians.
    Related Prints
    E50 Samuel Alken after Wilson, The Gypsies, 1783, The British Museum (1877,0811.497) plus other impressions
    E72/5 Thomas Hastings after Wilson, The Gypsies, The British Museum (1854,0708.62)
    Versions
    See 'Links' tab
    Critical commentary
    This painting shares stylistic similarities with P162 Cicero and his two Friends, Atticus and Quintus, at his Villa at Arpinum, Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, such as the summary modelling of the figures and heavy dotting of the foliage. The composition may be seen as less classical and more picturesque than the earlier Italian landscapes, showing Italy as a contemporary foreign land rather than the setting for ruins of classical antiquity.
    Bibliography
    Booth Notes Doc. 5, p. 2: 'Gypsies in wood with the subterranean cavern 15 m. from Rome painted for do. [P. Sandby]'; Booth Notes Doc. 9 (10 - Entrance to a Wood. Gypsies, old decay'd Tree. Rome in distance (was P. Sandby's) 16 1/2- 13 1/2.); WGC pp. 47, 73, 94, 110, 119-200, pl. 79b; Solkin 1982, p. 243; Williams 2011, pp. 36-37, repr.

    Work of Art

    Prints

    • Samuel Alken (1756-1815) after Wilson, The Gypsies, The British Museum
    • Thomas Hastings after Wilson, The Gypsies, The British Museum

    Versions

    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)and Studio, Gypsies near the Entrance to a Wood, Anglesey Abbey, National Trust
    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) Gypsies on the Way to Rome, Old Westbury Gardens, New York

    Exhibitions

    • London, Tate Gallery, Cardiff, National Museum of Wales, and New Haven, Conn., Yale Center for British Art, 3 November 1982 - 19 June 1983
    • Birmingham City Art Gallery, 17 November 1948 - 9 January 1949
    • London, Tate Gallery, 22 January - 14 March 1949
    • Brighton, Fine Art Galleries, 28 February - 2 May 1920
    • Conwy, Royal Cambrian Academy, 24 October - 23 December 2009
    • Weston Park, The Granary Art Gallery, 2 April - 3 July 2011
    • London, Royal Academy, 14 December 1968 - 2 March 1969
    • Exeter, Royal Albert Memorial Museum, 7 March - 5 April 1946
    • Sudbury, Gainsborough's House, 11 January - 31 May 2014

    Biographies

    • Benjamin Booth (1732-1807)
    • Paul Sandby (c.1730-1809)
    • Sir Brinsley Ford (1908-1999)
    • The Revd Richard Salwey Booth (1762-1807)
    • Elizabeth Booth (1763-1819)
    • Marianne Booth, Lady Ford (1767-1849)
    • Sir Richard Ford (1758-1806)

    Documents

    • William George Constable, Richard Wilson
    • David Solkin, Richard Wilson: The Landscape of Reaction
    • Gareth Williams, Masterpieces from the Ford Collection
    • Benjamin Booth, Unpublished Notes, Document 9: List of Wilson's Landscapes with Sizes and former Owners
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