Thomas Gainsborough (1727–1788), Landscape with a Decayed Willow over a Pool
, Pencil, Purchased by Pierpont Morgan, 1910
, III, 47
Although engraved by W. F. Wells and published by Wells and Laporte on 1 January 1805, this drawing actually belongs to Gainsborough's Suffolk period of the early to mid-1750s, when his subjects were chiefly woodland scenes, with pools or streams, winding tracks, and cottages nestled among trees. Withered or pollarded trees, especially the latter, which lent themselves so well to rococo treatment, were also familiar motifs.