English artist Thomas Girtin (1775-1802) is one of the founders of the national school of watercolor. Girtin improved the technique of watercolor, first using absorbent bleached paper, abandoning the monochrome preparation of the sheet, enriching the colors of the watercolor landscape with tones of pure color and a freer manner of washes, giving it the quality of true picturesqueness.

Studied with E. Deyes, with whom he worked in 1792 for the antiquarian J. Moore. Accompanying the latter, he traveled to Scotland. In the early 1790s, he earned money by coloring engravings for the famous merchant J. Smith, where he met Turner. Approx. 1794 both joined the circle of Dr. T. Monroe, where they were engaged in copying the works of Cozens, Canaletto and others.

Girtin traveled a lot around the country, in 1796 he again went to Scotland and the north of England, where romantic memories of the Middle Ages were alive, preserved in the images of untouched nature and architecture.

In 1797-98 he visited Wales. Maturity came to the artist early. He quickly overcame the limitations of the topographical landscape, and by 1794 the main features of his individual style had formed. Dismissing the canons of classicism, often refusing to develop the foreground, Girtin sought to capture an open space. Some of his compositions are characterized by a panoramic quality, when the viewer’s gaze freely rushes into the vastness and distance. Ancient architecture, which has always attracted the artist, is treated by him as an integral, natural part of the landscape, like hills, rivers, copses and pastures. The artist’s emotional works are imbued with a romantic sense of nature, which was developed in the works of Turner and then Constable. More than 100 of Girtin’s works are kept in the British Museum.