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Art and artists

Landscapes in line and ink

The close relationship between landscape architecture and landscape painting ensured that Brown’s work attracted the attention of artists as well as tourists and publishers. While many derivative views were produced by professionals and amateurs alike, the beauty of improved estate gardens and parks led many of the most influential and innovative artists to paint them, either speculatively or under commission. This was perhaps unsurprising as the landscapes themselves had so frequently been inspired by art. As Albert Boime has observed, clients often wanted landscape gardeners to ‘design their estates as real-time versions of the classicizing landscapes of Claude Lorrain and Nicholas Poussin’. In fulfilling that request, Brown and his fellow architects fuelled a cycle of influence between art and reality that reshaped the nation’s approach to both the natural and the man-made world.