John Robert Cozens
Encyclopedia
Drawing
Drawing is a form of visual art that makes use of any number of drawing instruments to mark a two-dimensional medium. Common instruments include graphite pencils, pen and ink, inked brushes, wax color pencils, crayons, charcoal, chalk, pastels, markers, styluses, and various metals .An artist who...
and painter
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
of romantic watercolour landscape
Landscape
Landscape comprises the visible features of an area of land, including the physical elements of landforms such as mountains, hills, water bodies such as rivers, lakes, ponds and the sea, living elements of land cover including indigenous vegetation, human elements including different forms of...
s.
Biography
The son of the Russian-born drawing master and watercolorist, Alexander CozensAlexander Cozens
Alexander Cozens was a British landscape painter in watercolours, a published teacher of painting, and father of John Robert Cozens.-Life:...
, John Robert Cozens was born in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. He studied under his father and began to exhibit some early drawings with the Society of Artists
Society of Artists
The Society of Artists of Great Britain was founded in London in May 1761 by an association of artists in order to provide a venue for the public exhibition of recent work by living artists, such as was having success in the long-established Paris salons....
in 1767. In 1776, he displayed a large oil painting
Oil painting
Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...
at the Royal Academy
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...
in London. 1776-79 he spent some time in Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
and Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, where he drew Alpine and Italian views. In 1779 he went back to London. In 1782, he made his second visit to Italy, accompanied by the author William Beckford
William Thomas Beckford
William Thomas Beckford , usually known as William Beckford, was an English novelist, a profligate and consummately knowledgeable art collector and patron of works of decorative art, a critic, travel writer and sometime politician, reputed to be the richest commoner in England...
, spending much time at Naples
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...
. In 1783, he returned to England. In 1789, he published a set of Delineations of the General Character ... of Forest Trees. He submitted his work to the Royal Academy
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...
but it was entirely rejected, being judged as "not proper art". At the age of 42, three years before he died, he suffered a nervous breakdown
Nervous breakdown
Mental breakdown is a non-medical term used to describe an acute, time-limited phase of a specific disorder that presents primarily with features of depression or anxiety.-Definition:...
and was committed to the Bethlem Royal Hospital
Bethlem Royal Hospital
The Bethlem Royal Hospital is a psychiatric hospital located in London, United Kingdom and part of the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust. Although no longer based at its original location, it is recognised as the world's first and oldest institution to specialise in mental illnesses....
asylum. The chief physician there was Dr. Thomas Monro
Thomas Monro
Thomas Monro was a British art collector and patron as well as Physician to George III. He was Principal Physician of the Bethlem Royal Hospital in London but resigned in June 1816 as a result of scandal when he was accused of ‘wanting in humanity’ towards his patients.Monro was best known as a...
who, also being a keen art collector, recognised Cozen's brilliance and bought his collection. Couzens died in London.
Works
Cozens executed watercolors in curious atmospherical effects and illusions which had some influence on Thomas GirtinThomas Girtin
Thomas Girtin was an English painter and etcher. A friend and rival of J. M. W. Turner, Girtin played a key role in establishing watercolour as a reputable art form.-Biography:...
and J.M.W. Turner. Indeed, his work is full of poetry
Poetry
Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning...
. There is a solemn grandeur in his Alpine views and a sense of vastness, a tender tranquillity and a kind of mystery in most of his paintings, leaving parts in his pictures for the imagination of the spectator to dwell on and search into. John Constable
John Constable
John Constable was an English Romantic painter. Born in Suffolk, he is known principally for his landscape paintings of Dedham Vale, the area surrounding his home—now known as "Constable Country"—which he invested with an intensity of affection...
called him "the greatest genius that ever touched landscape." On the other hand, Cozens never departed from his primitive, almost rudimentary, manner of painting, which causes several of his works to look very like colored engraving
Engraving
Engraving is the practice of incising a design on to a hard, usually flat surface, by cutting grooves into it. The result may be a decorated object in itself, as when silver, gold, steel, or glass are engraved, or may provide an intaglio printing plate, of copper or another metal, for printing...
s.
In June 2010 Cozen's Lake Albano (c.1777) sold, at auction at Sotheby's
Sotheby's
Sotheby's is the world's fourth oldest auction house in continuous operation.-History:The oldest auction house in operation is the Stockholms Auktionsverk founded in 1674, the second oldest is Göteborgs Auktionsverk founded in 1681 and third oldest being founded in 1731, all Swedish...
in London, for £2.4 million, a record for any 18th-century British watercolour.
Further reading
- K. Sloan, Alexander and John Robert Cozens The Poetry of Landscape (1986)
- A. P. Oppe, Alexander and John Robert Cozens (1952)