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 Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus seen from the Small Theatre 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus seen from the Small Theatre’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 26 Recto:
The Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus seen from the Small Theatre 1819
D15786
Turner Bequest CLXXXV 26
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘sea’ within centre of sketch, above ruins
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘278’ bottom right and ‘26’ top right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXV 26’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner’s viewpoint for this sketch of Pompeii was the upper circle of seating in the Small Theatre looking south-west towards the outer wall of the Great Theatre with the distant Lattari Mountains and Sorrentine peninsula beyond. The artist has noted within the drawing that he can see the sea. The area on the left-hand side of the composition is the Quadriporticus, a large open space surrounded by a portico of Doric columns which served as a kind of a foyer to the theatres. A number of gladiatorial weapons were discovered here suggesting that the building may have been used as a barracks, and during the nineteenth century the area was more commonly known as the ‘Soldier’s Quarters’.1 An alternative view can be seen on folio 25 verso (D15785). For further sketches and a general discussion of Turner’s visit to Pompeii see the introduction to the sketchbook.

Nicola Moorby
October 2010

1
‘Brief Guide to Pompeii’, Soprintendenza archeologica di Pompeii 2002. Compare the plate after a drawing by Major James Cockburn, ‘Forum Nundinarium commonly called the Soldier’s Quarters’ 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.[40].

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘The Great Theatre and the Quadriporticus seen from the Small Theatre 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, October 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-great-theatre-and-the-quadriporticus-seen-from-the-small-r1138252, accessed 23 September 2024.