[17] Imaginative reconstruction drawing of design for a Triumphal Bridge, design not submitted to the Parma Academy, 1779-80

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Sir John Soane office drawings: the drawings of Sir John Soane and the office of Sir John Soane
- Soane's architectural education: Royal Academy and Italy including measured drawings: 1770-1780
  - Soane's architectural education including theoretical designs made for the Royal Academy Schools and for exhibition at the Royal Academy, 1770-80, and in Italy, 1778-80
    - Design for a Triumphal Bridge for the Royal Academy Schools Gold Medal competition 1776, later revised and sent to the Parma Academy, 1780, with preliminary designs by George Dance, 1776 and ? 1778, and later copies and perspectives, 1796-c.1827 (21)

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Reference number

SM 12/5/6

Purpose

[17] Imaginative reconstruction drawing of design for a Triumphal Bridge, design not submitted to the Parma Academy, 1779-80

Aspect

Perspective drawn from a low riverside viewpoint of a design for a triumphal bridge with 7 arches and simple river stairs. It has an uninterrupted parapet (except for some statues) and the central dome is minimized while the staccato rhythm of fluted Greek Doric columns (2424248424242) set between antae is emphasised

Medium and dimensions

Pen, burnt umber, blue, pink, green and sepia washes, watercolour technique, shaded, within triple ruled and sepia wash border on wove paper (634 x 971)

Hand

J.M.Gandy (1771-1843)

Watermark

1794 J Whatman

Notes

Between May and June 1799 the office Day Book includes the following entries by Gandy: 'Perspective view of a Bridge' (between 18 May and 4 June, 16 working days, SM 12/5/5); 'Abt Bridge' (between 5 and 8 June, 4 working days, the drawing shown here) and (from 10 June to 19 July, 17 working days and definitely SM P258) 'Perspective View of a Triumphal Bridge'. Thus it is assumed that SM 12/5/5, this drawing and SM P258 were made in that period and in that sequence.

Though four days seems insufficient time for this drawing ('Abt Bridge), it is the least complicated since it mostly shows one side of the bridge to the river. With its severe, 'stripped' Doric monumentality, lit by a softly luminous sunset and with a violet-shadowed river, it is also the most arresting of the two perspectives.

The design (rejected by Soane for submission to the Parma Academy) was based on drawings of which only the plan (SM 45/1/34) now survives. While SM 45/1/34 closely follows the simpler scheme A of George Dance's plan (6a, left-hand side), neither of the alternative elevations, A1 or A2, are readily seen in Gandy's perspective though A2 (right-hand side) has a rather severe colonnade. Soane exhibited a 'Design for a triumphal bridge, for which the diploma of the Academy of Parma was given' (SM P352, q.v.) and 'Design for a triumphal bridge' (SM 12/5/7, q.v.) at the Royal Academy in 1799. However, the annual exhibition was always opened on 23 April which rules out the drawings catalogued here. The next time that Soane exhibited a 'Design for a triumphal bridge' at the R.A. was in 1806 and that was probably (the framed) SM P528.

Level

Drawing

Digitisation of the Drawings Collection has been made possible through the generosity of the Leon Levy Foundation

If you have any further information about this object, please contact us: drawings@soane.org.uk

Sir John Soane's collection includes some 30,000 architectural, design and topographical drawings which is a very important resource for scholars worldwide. His was the first architect’s collection to attempt to preserve the best in design for the architectural profession in the future, and it did so by assembling as exemplars surviving drawings by great Renaissance masters and by the leading architects in Britain in the 17th and 18th centuries and his near contemporaries such as Sir William Chambers, Robert Adam and George Dance the Younger. These drawings sit side by side with 9,000 drawings in Soane’s own hand or those of the pupils in his office, covering his early work as a student, his time in Italy and the drawings produced in the course of his architectural practice from 1780 until the 1830s.

Browse (via the vertical menu to the left) and search results for Drawings include a mixture of Concise catalogue records – drawn from an outline list of the collection – and fuller records where drawings have been catalogued in more detail (an ongoing process).