Although Towne began his artistic training aged about thirteen or fourteen, the first documented work is his winning entry for the 1759 Society of Arts competition for young artists, category 67, for “an original design for Cabinet makers, Coachmakers, manufacturers in Metals, China and Earthenware”. The category was discontinued after 1759. Towne was awarded the first premium on 14 February by a large and eminent examining committee comprising Reynolds, Highmore, Hollis, Kirby, Choore, Stuart, Pine, P. Theobold, Dalton, Paine, Wilton, Batchelor, Hayman, G. Mathias, Hayward, Duane, Shackleton, Chambers, W. Stevens, J. Smith, Birch, Lowth, Goodchild, Eckorsdale, R. Wilson, J. S. Wilkes, Ramsay, Rogers, Fanquise, Dupont, Long, Bellers, Anderson, Pinchbeck, R. Warner, Major, McArdel, W. Lloyd, Mellish, Spang, and Cooper Jnr.¹ The value of Towne’s prize is uncertain. Wilcox states 15 guineas,² but the Society of Arts’s Minute Book gives 21 guineas, of which Towne, as the main prizewinner, received the largest part. Robert Dossie, writing in 1784, states that Towne received “1st sh.” of 15 guineas,³ but Bailey in 1782 stated that the total premium was £21, of which Towne received 6 guineas.⁴ A Society of Arts publication of 1778 gave Towne’s share as 5 guineas.⁵ As valuable as the money was, the greater prize was the attention and kudos. The circumstances in which Towne’s drawing was exhibited in 1759 are unclear, but the following year the premium drawings were put on display in the Society of Arts meeting room at the Society’s own expense.

In his autobiographical letter of 1803 Towne recollected this work as a landscape, according it a pivotal status in his early professional life: “At fourteen years of age I began to paint in oil, before I was twenty I had the premium for the best drawing of landscape, at the Arts and Sciences, after that I set out in the great World.” Among Towne’s fellow competitors for Society of Arts prizes in 1759 were William Pars and Richard Cosway, whose friendships with Towne may date from this time. The winners of Society of Arts premiums were announced in the London press.