William Gilpin was a watercolourist, vicar and headmaster of Cheam School until 1777. He is notable for being one of the first advocates of the idea of the 'picturesque'.

During the summer months, Gilpin travelled around the country, making watercolours and keeping journals in which he crystallised his personal theories about picturesque landscapes. He believed that, when drawing, an artist ought to look for the view that would most create a suitable image: one which conveyed aspects of the sublime (ruins, mountains etc) and the beautiful (light and shade, trees, pastoral scenes etc). Gilpin advocated that artistic license could be used where necessary, perhaps by adding a bridge where there was one, making ruins more ruinous or by slipping a tree into the background. Gilpin initially wrote his accounts for the use of his friends but he was persuaded to publish them by the poet William Mason.

This book, Observations on the River Wye was first published in 1782 and was one of the first pieces of literature which described an artistic tour of the picturesque. It contains several aquatints from Gilpin's watercolours, executed by his elder brother Sawrey Gilpin, and the suggestion that "a mallet judiciously used" by the artist when drawing Tintern Abbey would only serve to improve what was already a picturesque site.

The idea of a picturesque tour became a popular one in the later part of the eighteenth century with professional and amateur artists travelling across the country to seek out the most suitable views.
This book was part of George III's personal library at Windsor