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 A Tabernacle on the Santa Lucia Quayside, Naples 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Tabernacle on the Santa Lucia Quayside, Naples’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 76 Recto:
A Tabernacle on the Santa Lucia Quayside, Naples 1819
D16055
Turner Bequest CLXXXVI 74
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘W’ in centre of sketch of tabernacle
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in red ink ‘74’ bottom left, inverted, and ‘245’ top left, inverted
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXVI 74’ top left, inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Like many British tourists in Italy during the nineteenth century, Turner was fascinated by the colourful, exotic spectacle of Roman Catholicism prevalent throughout the country.1 Comparison with a sketch in the Gandolfo to Naples sketchbook (Tate D15675; Turner Bequest CLXXXIV 58C), reveals that the subject of this study is a religious tabernacle which stood on the quayside in the Santa Lucia district of Naples near the Fontana di Santa Lucia. There appears to a religious procession carrying devotional standards in front of the object. For further sketches of the waterfront see folios 75 verso and 76 verso (D16054 and D16056; Turner Bequest CLXXXVI 73a and 74a).

Nicola Moorby
July 2010

1
See Cecilia Powell, Italy in the Age of Turner: “The Garden of the World”, exhibition catalogue, Dulwich Picture Gallery, London 1998, pp.48–55.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘A Tabernacle on the Santa Lucia Quayside, Naples 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-a-tabernacle-on-the-santa-lucia-quayside-naples-r1137979, accessed 26 April 2024.