07053
John Glover (1767 – 1849)
Mill on the Tiber(After Claude) c. 1840
Oil on canvas
76 x 114 cm
Unsigned

This previously unrecorded painting would appear to be the companion picture to the Tasmanian version of Landscape with Piping Shepherd, a free, ‘from memory’ copy of Glover’s other Claude, The Mill on the Tiber.

The rediscovery of this work is therefore a matter of considerable art-historical interest.

Like many of Glover’s oils, the work was cleaned and relined early last century, resulting in the loss of the artist’s delicate, translucent glazes in some areas.

Nevertheless, it is clearly from the artist’s hand and from his Australian years. To begin with, it is painted on a canvas measuring 76 x 114cm (2ft 6in x 3ft 9in), his ‘standard size’ in Tasmania. The bright blue sky with its separate layers of cirrus and cumulus clouds is characteristic of the later Glover, as is the dappled sun and blue of the distant hills.

The sinuous curves of the central tree, the ‘split-brush’ foliage, and the low light touching the edges of leaves are all typical elements of Glover’s vocabulary of landscape forms.

Furthermore, the treatment of the empty foreground, with its touches of russet and mossy green is strongly reminiscent of that in two late views of Tivoli.

Dr David Hansen
Curator, John Glover and the Colonial Picturesque
(Tasmanian Museum & Art Gallery and Art Exhibitions Australia, 2003)