Thomas Gainsborough R.A. 1727 - 1788

"Constable used to say it made him cry to look at them, and that no one at the present day could approach him" (R.B. Beckett ed. John Constable's Correspondence, Vol. XI, 1967, p. 72).
These words were written by the Reverend Henry Scott Trimmer about the eight early landscapes by Gainsborough which he inherited from his grandfather, Joshua Kirby, a close friend of Gainsborough. This exquisite little landscape forms part of this group and was painted in London in circa. 1745-1746 when the young eighteen-year old painter had just completed his studies and had established his own studio, possible in Hatton Garden. The poetic composition, and in particular the confident use of light and shade, show how much the young artist had learnt in his few years in London.

Gainsborough had been sent to London in 1740 at the age of only thirteen. His father had appreciated his natural talent and was anxious that he should benefit from the widening of both his education and his aesthetic horizons. London was an exciting place for a young artist and Gainsborough was able to benefit from the teaching of Gravelot and Hayman, and see some of the revolutionary work being produced by William Hogarth. Gainsborough also benefited from unprecedented activity in the London art market where works by such painters as Ruisdael, Wijnants and Hobbema were appearing. Seeing works by these masters enabled Gainsborough to improve the composition of his pictures. The fusion of his natural instinct for depicting landscape with the finely formed compositional devices of the Dutch painters led to such great early masterpieces as Gainsborough's Forest of 1746-1747 (National Gallery) and The Charterhouse of 1748 (Thomas Coram Foundation).

Though he was based in London until his return to Sudbury in 1748, Gainsborough certainly returned on occasions to Suffolk and his early landscapes painted in London reflect his memories of his native landscape where he would have noted shepherds resting by their sheep, the details of the trees and their foilage and the movement of the clouds. This little landscape is, as John Hayes pointed out, the most strongly and dramatically lit of all his early landscapes and though the device of the sunlight catching a figure in a landscape is seen often in Ruisdael, it becomes here the focus of the entire composition. Such a vivid natural effect from such a young artist shows why he was chosen to contribute to the paintings which were presented to the Foundling Hospital and why The Charterhouse stood out as the most successful of the group.

The painting was one of a group acquired from the artist by his friend, Joshua Kirby. Born in Suffolk like Gainsborough, Kirby ran a house painter's business in Ipswich from 1738 to 1755 and became a close friend of the younger artist. He later moved to London and taught perspective drawing to the young George, Prince of Wales, later George III who made him Clerk of the Works at Kew. Kirby also had the unusual title of "Designer in Perspective to His Majesty". For two years he was President of the Society of Artists. Gainsborough particularly requested that he be buried near his friend's grave at Kew. The group of eight paintings owned by Kirby included such other fine works as the little Beit landscape, the early landscape now at Upton House and the exquisite landscape of c. 1746-1747 at Cincinnati Art Museum. All eight pictures passed to the Reverend Scott Trimmer, son of Kirby's daughter, Sarah, who had married James Trimmer. Henry Scott Trimmer was vicar of Heston in Middlesex from 1804 until 1859, and was a competent landscape painter and friend of a number of artists, notably Turner, Constable and Zoffany.