A View in Kew Gardens of the Alhambra and the Pagoda

A View in Kew Gardens of the Alhambra and the Pagoda

Heinrich Joseph Schütz

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Shortly after being appointed architect to Augusta, Dowager Princess of Wales, William Chambers designed a series of exotic garden pavilions for the newly transformed Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, near London. The Alhambra and the Chinese Pagoda, built in 1758 and 1761 respectively, are shown here. Schütz's aquatint stresses the magnificent trees of the garden setting, while the watercolor additions help to contrast the Alhambra's fanciful Rococo character with the greater Oriental accuracy of the 163-foot-high Pagoda.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

A View in Kew Gardens of the Alhambra and the PagodaA View in Kew Gardens of the Alhambra and the PagodaA View in Kew Gardens of the Alhambra and the PagodaA View in Kew Gardens of the Alhambra and the PagodaA View in Kew Gardens of the Alhambra and the Pagoda

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.