Note 601 — Chapter VI · LANDSCAPE PAINTING

Cozens had a curious way of getting hints for landscape composition. He taught his pupils to splash paint on the bottoms of earthenware plates and to stamp impressions therefrom on sheets of damp paper. The accidental forms thus struck out were counted a help to invention. The early exhibitions record many bizarre attempts at landscapes such as “A landscape done in needlework and human hair” (1772), “three drawings made upon a board with a hot iron“ (1777), “flowers cut in cork,” “three small landscapes made in oil with Trees and Shrubs in sea-weed” (1780). These were apparently exhibited in all seriousness. In 1770 there was “A landscape in colored wax.”