Claude Lorrain, A Ruin on the Palatine Hill, 1630–35, black chalk, brush, and brown ink with gray wash on beige laid paper. The Clark, 2007.5.10

Claude Lorrain is widely recognized as a fountainhead of the European and American landscape tradition. In 2007, with the acquisition of a group of sixteen drawings by Claude, the Clark suddenly became one of the most important repositories of his drawings outside of Europe. Claude's legacy is broadly manifest in the Clark's collection and also resonates with the pastoral setting of its campus. Further examples of French, Italian, Dutch, and German landscape drawings have joined the collection over the ensuing years, allowing a broad look at varying national approaches to this genre. Together, these works demonstrate the importance of landscape—as both a documentary practice and an imaginative outlet—to artists from the early seventeenth through the late nineteenth century.