Design for a greenhouse: elevation, 1775

John Yenn RA (1750 - 1821)

RA Collection: Art

This is a very fine drawing, the architecture drawn with Yenn's usual high detailing and with beautifully rendered plants and foliage. Moreover, the addition of gouache gives the sheet vibrancy.

Yenn exhibited this drawing at the Royal Academy in 1775, the year he signed and dated it. The elevation emulates one of his favoured compositional themes of an arcaded portico with a small belvedere that he employed in his designs for casinos. Here he has used the Doric order on a rusticated wall. In each of the seven arches he has positioned an orange tree in tubs of alternating round and square forms. Yenn has even drawn the debris of classical ruins in the foreground, a popular neo-classical affectation in architectural drawing during the period.