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Capriccio showing ruined classical buildings in a densely wooded landscape.
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Reference number
Adam vol.56/50
Purpose
Capriccio showing ruined classical buildings in a densely wooded landscape.
Aspect
Perspective
Inscribed
Inscribed on drawing in ink 90; in red ink on backing sheet 50
Signed and dated
- Undated, probably c.1756.
Medium and dimensions
Pencil and pen; grey wash on grey washed paper267 x 423, mounted on backing sheet 322 x 471
Hand
Robert Adam
Verso
Verso of backing sheet has remains of four corners of a drawing dated 1755; these fragments are likely to be from Adam vol.56/167 as the paper colour and chalk framing line fit closely; similar fragments are found on the verso of 56/53.
Notes
The drawings in Adam vol.56/49-54 are part of a set of landscape compositions by Robert Adam. They are all of a similar size, on grey washed paper and in the style of Jean-Baptiste Lallemand (1716-1803), but sources of the compositions may differ. It is likely that these drawings were part of a larger group since each has a number between 83 and 94, inscribed in the eighteenth century. They were probably made in Rome in c.1756; Robert Adam wrote in November of that year that he had been working on such 'kind of ... sketches...' and had '... already made out a dozen different views as unlike one another as I could ...' (Fleming Robert Adam and His Circle in Edinburgh & Rome (London, 1962), p.363). This set of drawings, of which this drawing is a typical example, may be compared with the landscape compositions in the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York (for example 1954-14) (see Tait Robert Adam: drawings and imagination (Cambridge, 1993), pp.20-23).
Level
Drawing
Exhibition history
Robert Adam, The Creative Mind: from the Sketch to the Finished Drawing, Sir John Soane's Museum, 4 October 1996 - 1 March 1997; The Frick Collection, New York, December 1997 - April 1998; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, May - June 1998; The Octagon Museum, Washington, July 1998 - January 1999; Scottish National Gallery, Edinburgh, February - March 1999
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