
In Tate Britain
Prints and Drawings Room
View by appointment- Artist
- William Pars 1742–1782
- Medium
- Graphite and watercolour on paper
- Dimensions
- Support: 243 × 337 mm
- Collection
- Tate
- Acquisition
- Purchased as part of the Oppé Collection with assistance from the National Lottery through the Heritage Lottery Fund 1996
- Reference
- T08276
Display caption
Like many of the landscape draughtmen of his day, Pars was chiefly dependent for his livelihood on aristocratic patronage and on the demand for careful records of antiquarian and topographical subjects. This watercolour documents a site he saw on a tour through Switzerland in 1770 with his patron Henry Temple, second Viscount Palmerston. Pars brings to the best of his work a degree of expressiveness which is unusual for works of topography at this date. Here, by boldly raising the arch of the stone bridge against the sky, he has produced a very daring composition, and he has coloured it very vividly in strong greens and yellows. Palmerston has inscribed the word 'marvellous' on the mount.
Gallery label, September 2004
Does this text contain inaccurate information or language that you feel we should improve or change? We would like to hear from you.
Explore
- architecture(30,959)
-
- bridges and viaducts(4,123)
-
- bridge(3,989)
- cities, towns, villages (non-UK)(13,325)
-
- Pollegio(1)
- Switzerland(1,058)
- Alps(836)
- River Ticino(3)
- transport: land(2,177)
-
- riding(512)
You might like
-
Samuel Hieronymous Grimm The Glacier of Simmenthal
1774 -
William Pars Rome: The Forum
c.1775 -
William Pars The Interior of the Colosseum
c.1775 -
William Pars Schaffhausen
c.1770 -
Jacob More Tivoli, Cascatelle
1778 -
William Pars The Salmon Leap on the Liffey near Leixlip
date not known -
William Pars Valle Crucis Abbey
date not known -
William Pars Waterfall near the Lake of Killarney
c.1771 -
John `Warwick’ Smith [15] [Bridge near Vietri]
1778–9 -
William Pars Near the Mont St Gothard
date not known -
William Pars Woman in Spanish Costume
date not known -
William Pars A View near Cluse in Savoy
date not known -
Carlo Labruzzi Bridge near Cagli
date not known -
Carlo Labruzzi Arch of Titus
date not known -
Carlo Labruzzi Grotto of Neptune at Tivoli
date not known