Francis Towne
Lake Albano

ArtistBritish, 1739–1816
CultureBritish
Titles
  • Lake Albano
Date1781
Place depictedItaly
MediumPen and gray ink and grayish-brown wash over graphite on laid paper
DimensionsSheet: 12 5/8 × 18 1/2 in. (32.1 × 47 cm)
Credit LineThe Stuart Collection, museum purchase funded by Francita Stuart Koelsch Ulmer in honor of Mary Hale Lovett McLean
Object number2017.367
Not on view

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Special Collections
ProvenanceFrancis Towne, July 10, 1781; bequeathed by the artist to James White (1744-1825), Exeter, in 1816; passed to Towne’s residuary legatee, John Herman Merivale (1779-1844), Barton Place, Exeter, in 1825; by descent, Maria Sophia Merivale (1853-1928) and Judith Ann Merivale (1860-1945), grand-daughters of the above, Oxford (Barton Place Inv. No. 23), May 15, 1915-1933; purchased from Judith Ann Merivale, [Squire Gallery, London, 1933-34]; purchased by Leonard G. Duke (1890–1971), February 1934; purchased by Nigel Warren QC (1912-67), November 1955-1967; by descent to 2002; [Christie’s, London, British Art on Paper, June 6, 2002, lot 9 (as “The Property of a Gentleman”); Private collection, USA, 2002-2014; [Lowell Libson, Ltd., London, 2014-2017]; purchased by MFAH, 2017.
Exhibition HistoryThree Exeter Artists of the Eighteenth Century: Francis Hayman RA, Francis Towne, John White Abbot, Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Festival of Britain, Exeter, May 8-September 12, 1951, cat. 188.

British Art, Lowell Libson, London, 2015 (exh. cat., 48049, illus.).
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
Verso: Signed, inscribed, dated and numbered in brown ink, upper right: No 2 Lake of Albano/Evening Sun behind the trees on the left/hand / July the 10th, 1781 / Francis Towne’

Verso: Inscribed in brown ink, left bottom edge: A copy of this painted on canvas [sic] the same size for James Curtis Esq. 1784

Verso: Watermark, center: J WHATMAN


Catalogue raisonnéStephens, Richard. A Catalogue Raisonné of Francis Towne (1739-1816). London: Paul Mellon Centre, 2016 (online catalogue).
View this object in The Stuart Collection

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