Gowanus Heights, Brooklyn

Bartlett employed a restricted palette of warm brown and tan tones, utilizing brush and brown ink with brown wash on wove paper to create a cohesive sepia effect. He combined loose, fluid washes with more controlled brushwork to delineate architectural and foliate details, the latter rendered with stippled techniques to suggest leafy textures. Depth is achieved through atmospheric perspective, transitioning from dark, saturated browns in the foreground to pale, atmospheric washes in the distance. Light is diffused evenly across the scene, lacking a strong directional source and casting soft shadows. The paper support shows slight aging and foxing, and the work is unsigned, though inscriptions in graphite on the verso identify the view and artist.

The drawing was created circa 1836 or 1837, likely as a preparatory design for a later steel engraving titled View from Gowanus Heights, Brooklyn, which was engraved by Henry Adlard and issued around 1838. The work's provenance traces to the collector John Davis Hatch, who owned it by 1976. Hatch lent the drawing to the Heim Gallery in London for the 1976 exhibition catalogue 100 American Drawings, where it appeared as number 20. In 1979, Hatch gifted the drawing to the National Gallery of Art. Graphite inscriptions on the center verso read New York from Gowanus Bay and about 1840, with two additional illegible lines, while the lower left verso bears the inscription Gowanus Heights, Brooklyn by Bartlett.

William Henry Bartlett was a prolific British topographical artist known for his extensive travels and depictions of landscapes and city views, which were widely disseminated through steel engravings in travel publications. His work on the American landscape, including views of New York and its environs, catered to a transatlantic audience eager for images of the developing nation. The 1838 engraved version of this view, executed by Henry Adlard, demonstrates how such drawings served as foundational designs for mass reproduction, situating the drawing within the broader commercial and topographical print culture of the 1830s.

As a topographical record, the drawing preserves a view of the Gowanus area before its transformation into a heavily industrial and residential zone. The existence of the 1838 Adlard engraving, held in the New York Public Library, underscores the drawing's role in shaping contemporary and historical perceptions of Brooklyn's landscape. Its preservation in the National Gallery of Art and its documentation in John Davis Hatch's 1976 exhibition catalogue have cemented its status as a significant artifact of pre-urban Brooklyn iconography.