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 > Pompeii, Amalfi, &c., Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Triangular Forum and the Doric Temple, Pompeii, with the Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Triangular Forum and the Doric Temple, Pompeii, with the Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 24 Recto:
The Triangular Forum and the Doric Temple, Pompeii, with the Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus 1819
D15782
Turner Bequest CLXXXV 24
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘50’ centre of sketch
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘278’ bottom right and ‘24’ top right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXV 24’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This sketch depicts a view of the Triangular Forum in Pompeii, a piazza located at the southern edge of the city with the Doric Temple on the west side and the theatre quarter on the east. A similar but less detailed vista can be found on folio 24 verso (D15783). Turner appears to have been looking north-east from an area of higher ground above the Doric Temple, the remains of which appear in the foreground. In the centre of the composition, beyond the ruined colonnade of the Forum (which Turner has annotated with the number ‘50’), is the outer wall of the Great Theatre with the adjacent Quadriporticus, a large porticoed space which acted as a foyer for the theatres.1 For an alternative view of the latter see folios 25 verso–26 (D15785–D15786), whilst further studies related to the Triangular Forum can be found on folios 14 verso, 16–16 verso, and 26 verso (D15763, D15766–D15767 and D15787). For other sketches and a general discussion of Turner’s visit to Pompeii see the introduction to the sketchbook.

Nicola Moorby
September 2010

1
Compare the plate after an 1817 drawing by Major James Cockburn, ‘The Greek Theatre Adjoining the Great Theatre’ in Pompeii, Illustrated with Picturesque Views, Engraved by W.B. Cooke, from the Original Drawings of Liet. Col. Cockburn, of the Royal Artillery, vol.I, London 1827, p.[41].

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘The Triangular Forum and the Doric Temple, Pompeii, with the Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 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-the-triangular-forum-and-the-doric-temple-pompeii-with-the-r1138248, accessed 19 April 2024.