Coastal Landscape

Alexander Cozens

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

In this imaginary view of a coastal landscape, a low shoreline on the left opens onto the sea and is framed in the background by a wooded hill. In the distance, a mountain castle overlooks the bay and a small island closes off the image to the right. The landscape is built up from just a few brush strokes in gray wash that are further accentuated with delicate graphite linework to indicate topography. Using the blank paper as the base tone of his composition, the artist skillfully interlaces dark and light areas in the water and on land to enliven an otherwise simple composition. This seemingly simple technique is highly effective in creating the impression of a sundrenched view.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art