William Hodges (London 1744-1797 Brixham, Devon)

This ostensibly Italian grotto scene is a copy, with some alterations, of a painting by Jacques Courtois (1621-1676) which was engraved by Jean-Baptiste-Claude Chatelain (1710-1758) for Arthur Pond's series of classical landscapes published in 1744 (see S. Sloman, Gainsborough in Bath, New Haven and London, p. 152, pl. 132).