Classical Statue and Temple (Roman Ruins)

Portfolios such as Pond and Knapton’s Seventy Prints in Imitation of Drawings, all based on Italian prototypes, helped to reinforce the classical landscape’s superior position—or to confirm the English public’s lazy prejudices, depending on one’s point of view. The two artist-publishers were shrewd businessmen who knew how to capitalize on popular tastes. The more printmakers copied Italian models, the more the public demanded them. In the 1740s, however, the English nobility did begin to buy Dutch landscape paintings, either from London dealers or in Holland on their way home from the Grand Tour. Arthur Pond began adding Dutch prints and drawings to his personal collection when a publishing venture of the 1740s brought him to Amsterdam.