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 > Tivoli to Rome Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Details of the Decorations of Raphael's Loggia in the Vatican: the Third and Fourth External Piers 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Details of the Decorations of Raphael's Loggia in the Vatican: the Third and Fourth External Piers’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 19 Recto:
Details of the Decorations of Raphael’s Loggia in the Vatican: the Third and Fourth External Piers 1819
D14963
Turner Bequest CLXXIX 19
Pencil on white wove paper, 189 x 112 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil with notes on Raphael’s loggia [see main catalogue entry]
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘19’ bottom right, descending right-hand edge
Stamped in black ‘CLXXIX 19’ bottom left, descending left-hand edge
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The sketches on this page relate to Turner’s painted recreation of the loggia on the right-hand side of Rome from the Vatican. Raffaelle Accompanied by La Fornarina, Preparing his Pictures for the Decoration of the Loggia exhibited 1820 (Tate, N00503).1 They depict the fresco and stucco decorations on the third and fourth external piers of the Loggia of Raphael and comprise two distinct groups. The study on the left-hand side represents the lower section of the lateral side (right-hand, or northern, as you are looking at the interior wall) of the third external pilaster (i.e. the pillar between the second and third window from the end). The grotesque decorations featured here include shells and other marine life and the sketch is inscribed with colour notes ‘Y’ and ‘P’. On the right-hand side is a study of the lower section of the facing (front) side of the fourth external pilaster (i.e. the pillar between the third and fourth window from the end) which includes a winged figure seated on a sphere or globe.2 Turner has variously annotated the drawing ‘Co’, ‘Yellow | Shol Blue’, ‘Co’ and ‘B’. Both drawings are continued on the opposite sheet of the double-page spread with the lower section of the pilasters, see folio 18 verso (D14962).
The decorations on the lateral side of the third pilaster appear in Rome from the Vatican to the immediate right of the foreground figure of Raphael. The details from the bottom of the fourth external pilaster, meanwhile, can be seen on the far left-hand side of the composition, dominating the full height of the picture space. Further studies related to the evolution of Rome from the Vatican can be found on folios 13 verso–18 verso, 20–21 verso and 25–26 (D14955–D14962, D14964–D14966 and D14970–D14972), as well as an elaborate compositional drawing in pen and ink in the Rome C. Studies sketchbook (Tate D16368; Turner Bequest CLXXXIX 41). For a full description of the loggia and Turner’s sketches see folio 14 (D14956).
1
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, no.228.
2
The details are repeated on the fourth internal pilaster, see the engraving by Volpato, reproduced in Nicole Dacos, Le Logge di Rafaello: Maestro e bottega di fronte all’antico, Rome 1977, Tav.LXXXIX b).
Verso:
Blank

Nicola Moorby
January 2010

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Details of the Decorations of Raphael’s Loggia in the Vatican: the Third and Fourth External Piers 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, January 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-details-of-the-decorations-of-raphaels-loggia-in-the-vatican-r1137595, accessed 08 May 2025.