View of the Campagna

It is known from the Claude Lorrain’s early biographers of his constant excursions from Rome, wandering over the whole range of the country, sketching it with the pen, in wash, and even in oils. His surviving drawings confirm the extent and the subtlety of his observation. The variety of the drawings is endless. Some are prosaic notes of a building or a prospect, put down in a hard pen outline. Others are more carefully studied descriptions of a section of the landscape. Others, such as this drawing, are the immediate record of a suddenly perceived contre-jour effect.