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  • image Adam vol.57/71

Reference number

Adam vol.57/71

Purpose

Italy: unidentified location. View of a square tower with machicolations, surrounded by irregular domestic buildings in a rocky landscape, with a tree.

Aspect

Perspective

Inscribed

Inscribed in ink 71

Signed and dated

  • Undated, probably 1755 or 1756.

Medium and dimensions

Pencil, pen, grey and brown washes; pencil framing lines top and bottom, 131 x 185

Hand

Robert Adam

Verso

Pencil and watercolour sketch of a tower on top of a high slope, which may have been a preliminary sketch for the more finished wash view.

Notes

This view by Robert Adam is similar in composition to Adam vol.57/58, which has a round rather than a square tower, and both can be related to six compositions by Charles-Louis Clérisseau for maison de campagne (see Charles-Louis Clérisseau (1721-1820) Dessins du musée de l'Ermitage Saint-Petersbourg, Musée du Louvre, Paris, 1995, p.148; Inv.2497-2502). A similar fortified village is also depicted in a watercolour attributed to Clérisseau in Adam vol.57/81. The composition and style of the drawing here show Adam working in the manner of Jean-Baptiste Lallemand, as in Adam vol.57/58.

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