In a letter sent to the amateur artist and collector Thomas Harvey (1748-1819), Gainsborough remarked: "I feel such a fondness for my first imitations of little Dutch Landskips." The artist was referring to works such as this sheet, in which his fascination with seventeenth-century Dutch landscapists is evident. The hectic handling and brittle strokes of the graphite, as well as its horizontal, small-scale format and subject matter, seem to have been inspired by the works of celebrated northern artists such as Anthonie Waterloo (1609/10-1690) and Jacob van Ruisdael (1628/29-1682). -- Exhibition Label, from "Thomas Gainsborough: Experiments in Drawings."
Watermark: Circle, fragment.
Murray, Charles Fairfax, 1849-1919, former owner.
Morgan, J. Pierpont (John Pierpont), 1837-1913, former owner.
Bolzoni, Marco S. Thomas Gainsborough : Experiments in Drawings. New York : The Morgan Library & Museum, 2018, p. 48, no. 3, repr.
Collection J. Pierpont Morgan : Drawings by the Old Masters Formed by C. Fairfax Murray. London : Privately printed, 1905-1912, III, 51.