View on the River Roseau, Dominica

Painting and Sculpture of Europe

1770/80

Agostino Brunias
Italian, active in England and the West Indies 1758–96

In this expansive view of Dominica, people along the riverbank bathe, wash linens, converse, and sell produce. The presence of indigenous Carib, African, Afro-Creole, European, and mixed-race individuals attests to the long history of white-settler colonialism in the West Indies, where valuable crops such as coffee and sugar were cultivated through the labor of enslaved people.

The Italian-born artist Agostino Brunias settled on the island, painting scenes of Caribbean life for his planter-class patrons as well as white audiences abroad. Eliding the brutal conditions of slavery, his compositions shaped a reassuring vision of British imperialism for those in power. Yet by centering enslaved and free people of color—and focusing on mixed-race interactions—he also foregrounded the human impact of colonialism.

Status: On loan to Royal Academy of Arts (Great Britain) in London for Entangled Pasts, 1768–now: Art, Colonialism and Change
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: Agostino Brunias
Title: View on the River Roseau, Dominica
Place: United Kingdom (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1770–1780
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 84.1 × 158 cm (33 1/8 × 62 3/16 in.); Framed: 99.4 × 173.1 × 10.8 cm (39 1/8 × 68 1/8 × 4 1/4 in.)
Credit Line: Gift of Emily Crane Chadbourne
Reference Number: 1953.14
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/79037/manifest.json

Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Collection (Chicago: The Art Institute, 1961), 61.
Hans Huth, “Agostino Brunias, Romano: Robert Adam’s ‘Bred Painter’,” Connoisseur 151 (December 1962): 296, fig. 6.
Susan Wise and Malcolm Warner, French and British Paintings from 1600 to 1800 in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Collection (Chicago: The Art Institute, 1996), 198–200, ill.
Katie A. Pfohl, ed., Inventing Acadia : painting and place in Louisiana, exh. cat. (New Orleans: New Orleans Museum of Art, 2019), 96-97, 98-99 fig. 8, 166 pl. 13, 226.
Sarah Lea, “Beauty and Difference: Landscape and Architecture,” in Entangled Pasts, 1768–Now: Art, Colonialism and Change, exh. cat. (London: Royal Academy of Arts, 2024), 104 (detail ill.), 105, 117 cat. 44.

Art Institute of Chicago, Selected Works of Eighteenth-Century French Art in the Collections of The Art Institute of Chicago, Jan. 24 – Mar. 28, 1976, cat. 22.
New Orleans Museum of Art, Inventing Acadia: Painting and Place in Louisiana, Nov. 16, 2019 – Jan. 26, 2020, no cat. no., pl. 13.
London, Royal Academy of Arts, Entangled Pasts, 1768–Now: Art, Colonialism and Change, Feb. 3 – Apr. 28, 2024, cat. 44.

Emily Crane Chadbourne, Stone Ridge, New York by 1952; given to the Art Institute, 1953.

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On loan to Royal Academy of Arts (Great Britain) in London for Entangled Pasts, 1768–now: Art, Colonialism and Change

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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On loan to Royal Academy of Arts (Great Britain) in London for Entangled Pasts, 1768–now: Art, Colonialism and Change

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

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