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Creator:
John Sell Cotman, 1782–1842
Title:

Yarmouth Sands, Norfolk

Date:
1820 to 1830
Medium:
Watercolor, gouache, graphite, and scraping out on medium smooth cream wove paper
Dimensions:
Sheet: 11 3/4 x 16 1/2 inches (29.8 x 41.9 cm)
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1981.25.2418
Classification:
Drawings & Watercolors
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
landscape | men | rowboat
Associated Places:
Norfolk | United Kingdom | Yarmouth
Access:
Accessible by appointment in the Study Room [Request]
Note: The Study Room is open by appointment. Please visit the Study Room page on our website for more details.
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:8729
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Cotman’s early ambitions were thwarted in 18o6 when his peers blackballed his attempt to join the newly formed Society of Painters in Water Colours. Excluded from this new body, he retreated to his native Norwich to work as a drawing master and never fully recovered from the blow to his prestige. This watercolor is derived from sketches made while staying at Yarmouth, an East Anglian seaside resort with broad beaches lapped by the North Sea. At this time he confessed to a friend that “for many weeks one overwhelming flood of despairing thoughts made every atom of my composition a separate torture.” It is hardly surprising that there is sometimes a restive quality about Cotman’s best later watercolors.

Gallery label for Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (Yale Center for British Art, 2008-06-09 - 2008-08-17)

Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (Yale Center for British Art, 2008-06-09 - 2008-08-17) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (The State Hermitage Museum, 2007-10-23 - 2008-01-13) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Great British Watercolors from the Paul Mellon Collection at the Yale Center for British Art (Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 2007-07-11 - 2007-09-30) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Presences of Nature - British Landscape 1780-1830 (Yale Center for British Art, 1982-10-20 - 1983-02-27) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

English Landscape (Paul Mellon Collection) 1630-1850 (Yale Center for British Art, 1977-04-19 - 1977-07-17) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Louis Hawes, Presences of Nature : British Landscape, 1780-1830, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1982, p. 140, no. II.25, pl. 115, ND1354.4 H38 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Christopher White, English landscape, 1630-1850, drawings, prints & books from the Paul Mellon Collection , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 1977, pp. 102-103, no. 181, pl. XXXII, NC228 W45 OVERSIZE (YCBA) [YCBA]

Yale Center for British Art, Great British watercolors : from the Paul Mellon Collection, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2007, pp. 134-35, no. 58, ND1928 .Y35 2007 (LC)+ Oversize (YCBA) [YCBA]


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