A Bird's-eye View of Clandon
Leendert Knijff (Haarlem 1650 – London 1721)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1708 (signed and dated)
Materials
Oil on canvas in frame.
Measurements
1499 x 2159 mm (59 x 85 in)
Place of origin
Clandon
Order this imageCollection
Clandon Park, Surrey
NT 1441485
Caption
The Dutch painter Leonard Knyff is best known for his paintings and engravings of the English country house, in which the viewer is offered an imaginary perspective above the building and its landscape. In these pictures, individual country houses, such as in this view of Clandon, are presented within the wider context of the working estate. This depiction of Clandon shows the original Jacobean house together with stable buildings and the earlier gardens, which were modified by ‘Capability’ Brown in the latter part of the eighteenth century. The proprietor’s interest in landscape gardening is also evident here, specifically in the paraded regiment of new trees.
Summary
[Destroyed in the fire of 2015] Oil painting on canvas, A Bird's-eye View of Clandon by Leendert Knijff (Haarlem 1650 – London 1721), signed: L. Knyff 1708. A bird's-eye view of the Elizabethan (or Jacobean) house in its 17th century formal setting.
Provenance
Acquired by the Ministry of Works from Gwendolen, Countess of Iveagh, in 1956, and transferred to the National Trust by HM Treasury in 1977
Credit line
Clandon Park, The Onslow Collection (National Trust)
Marks and inscriptions
Marked.
Makers and roles
Leendert Knijff (Haarlem 1650 – London 1721), artist Jacob Knyff (Haarlem 1638 - London 1681), artist
References
Honour 1954 Hugh Honour, 'Leonard Knyff', The Burlington Magazine, XCVL, 1954, pp. 337-8 Harris 1979 John Harris, The Artist and the Country House. A History of Country House and Garden View Painting in Britain 1540-1870, London 1979, no. 114 Prized Possessions: Dutch Paintings from National Trust Houses (exh. cat.), Holburne Museum, Bath 25 May - 16 Sep 2018; Mauritshuis, The Hague, 11 Oct 2018 - 6 Jan 2019; Petworth House, West Sussex, 26 Jan - 24 Mar 2019., p. 113