J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > First Italian Tour 1819-20 > Naples, Paestum and Rome Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Two Sketches of the Ponte del Diavolo, Molina 1819

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Two Sketches of the Ponte del Diavolo, Molina’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 44 Recto:
Two Sketches of the Ponte del Diavolo, Molina 1819
D15994
Turner Bequest CLXXXVI 42
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Moulina’ bottom right of main sketch
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in red ink ‘42’ top right and ‘245’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXVI 42’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This page contains two sketches of Molina, a small town named after its water mills (mulino), which lies in the valley (Valle Bonea) north of Vietri sul Mare on the inland road between Naples and Salerno. The subject of the main sketch is the vista looking towards Cava de’ Tirreni from the eastern end of the Ponte del Diavolo, an aqueduct which spanned the width of the valley until it was destroyed by a flood in 1954. The smaller study in the top right-hand corner represents the view looking in the opposite direction, south towards Vietri sul Mare and the coast. The dome and bell-tower of San Giovanni Battista are silhouetted against the horizon.
For further sketches of the Ponte del Diavolo see folios 41 and 42 verso (D15988 and D15991; Turner Bequest CLXXXVI 39 and 40a), and also the Pompeii, Amalfi, Sorrento, Herculaneum sketchbook (Tate D15752 and D15797–D15799; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 8a and 32–33).

Nicola Moorby
July 2010

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Two Sketches of the Ponte del Diavolo, Molina 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, July 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-two-sketches-of-the-ponte-del-diavolo-molina-r1137918, accessed 25 April 2024.