Footnotes

• Provenance
  Private collection, Italy
  
  Literature
  Massimo Ricciardi, Paesaggisti stranieri in Campania nell'Ottocento, Salerno, 2002, p.24-26 and 28, illustrated figs. 3, 4
  
  Alexander Nasmyth was born in Edinburgh in September 1758. His father was an architect and builder and he was initially educated at home, before attending 'Mammy' Smith's school in the Grassmarket, and then the high school where he studied arithmetic and geometry in preparation for a career in the family business.
  
  Alexander was however drawn to life as an artist, and while working with James Cummyng, a tradesman-house painter, his talent was spotted by Allan Ramsay, principal painter in ordinary to George III. Ramsay persuaded Cummyng to release his apprentice and the young Alexander journeyed south to London where he began work in Ramsay's studio.
  
  Towards the end of 1778, he returned to Edinburgh and began his practice as a portrait painter. He gradually evolved a style of his own, placing the sitters within a landscape and gradually the backgrounds became as important as the sitters.
  
  In common with many of his contemporaries Nasmyth left Scotland in December 1782 to continue his studies abroad. He arrived in Rome in April 1783 and began an extensive journey through Italy visiting The Bay of Naples, Bolsena, Ancona and Tivoli.
  
  He returned to Edinburgh at the end of 1784 and continued his practice as a portrait and landscape painter. His landscapes, principally influenced by Claude Lorrain and Ruisdael, are tranquil, finely detailed and romantic. By all accounts Alexander Nasmyth was a delightful, kind and humorous man – a polymath, combining a prodigious artistic talent with a practical knowledge of engineering and architecture.
  
  He died in April 1840 and was buried in St Cuthbert's churchyard, Edinburgh.