Past Exhibition

Gainsborough Drawings

The image shows a pastoral scene with a low horizon, distant hills, sparse trees, and a wooden cart being drawn by two oxen with a man on top. There are clouds above the horizon and the brushstrokes create texture, capturing details like the cart's wood grain and foliage tufts. The color scheme is monochromatic, suggesting the image is a drawing or print, evoking a serene atmosphere. The ground is textured with rocks along a pathway leading towards the cart and the countryside.
Thomas Gainsborough, Drover with Calves in a Country Cart, c. 1755, graphite with gray wash on laid paper, Gift of Howard Sturges, 1956.9.25

Details

  • Dates

    -

  • Locations

    West Building, Ground Floor, Graphics Galleries GS-1, GS-2, GS-3, GS-4 (2,500 sq. ft.)
The image shows a pastoral scene with a low horizon, distant hills, sparse trees, and a wooden cart being drawn by two oxen with a man on top. There are clouds above the horizon and the brushstrokes create texture, capturing details like the cart's wood grain and foliage tufts. The color scheme is monochromatic, suggesting the image is a drawing or print, evoking a serene atmosphere. The ground is textured with rocks along a pathway leading towards the cart and the countryside.
Thomas Gainsborough, Drover with Calves in a Country Cart, c. 1755, graphite with gray wash on laid paper, Gift of Howard Sturges, 1956.9.25

Overview: 91 drawings by Thomas Gainsborough were selected by John Hayes, director of the National Portrait Gallery, London, and Lindsay Stainton, British Museum, for the International Exhibitions Foundation.

Organization: This was the first exhibition of Gainsborough drawings in the United States. It was coordinated at the National Gallery by Virginia Tuttle.

Sponsor: The project was supported by an indemnity from the Federal Council on the Arts and the Humanities. The catalogue was underwritten in part by grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the British Council.

Attendance: 38,065

Catalog: Gainsborough Drawings, by John Hayes and Lindsay Stainton. Washington, DC: International Exhibitions Foundation, 1983.

Other Venues:

  • Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth
  • Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Connecticut

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