Picturing Nature: The Stuart Collection of 18th- and 19th-Century British Landscapes and Beyond January 12–July 6, 2025

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Featuring over 70 works of art in a variety of media, Picturing Nature: The Stuart Collection of 18th- and 19th-Century British Landscapes and Beyond explores how the genre of landscape evolved during an era of immense transformation in Britain. This diverse collection of watercolors, drawings, prints, and oil sketches traces the shift from topographical and picturesque depictions of the natural world to intensely personal ones that align with Romantic poetry of the period.

Curated by Dena M. Woodall, curator of prints and drawings at the MFAH, the exhibition spotlights the Stuart Collection, built over the past decade in collaboration with Houstonian Francita Stuart Koelsch Ulmer. This exceptional collection includes standout works by such notable artists as Richard Wilson, Thomas Gainsborough, John Robert Cozens, John Constable, and J.M.W. Turner, whose innovative approaches to watercolor raised its status as an art form and heralded a golden age for the medium.

Through the work of these luminaries and their contemporaries, Picturing Nature reveals how landscape emerged as a distinct artistic genre in England in the late 1700s, then reached its greatest heights the following century, attracting international response and inspiring both artists and collectors at home and abroad. Period publications and artist’s supplies, including drawing manuals and a mid-19th-century Winsor & Newton watercolor box, further illustrate the flowering of the landscape tradition. 

► Publication
The illustrated exhibition catalogue is available through the MFA Shop (713.639.7360) and the Museum’s Hirsch Library (713.639.7325).

Picturing Nature: The Stuart Collection of 18th- and 19th-Century British Landscapes and Beyond / January 12–July 6, 2025