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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Perspective lectures c.1809-28 > I. Numbered Perspective Diagrams > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Lecture Diagram 3: Lower Part of the Column of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Rome c.1810

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Lecture Diagram 3: Lower Part of the Column of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Rome’ c.1810
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Lecture Diagram 3: Lower Part of the Column of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Rome circa 1810
D17121
Turner Bequest CXCV 150
Pencil and watercolour on white wove paper, 552 x 774 mm
Watermarked ‘LEPARD 1794’
Inscribed by Turner in red watercolour ‘3’ top left
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘150’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
As Professor of Perspective at the Royal Academy, Turner devoted a large part of Lecture 1 to sculpture, discussing how the Romans adjusted the proportions of their figures depending upon the distance from which they would be seen by the viewer. According to Turner, this is exemplified by the Columns of Trajan (113 AD) and Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (176–93 AD) in Rome, both of which depict victorious military campaigns in spiral bas relief high above the spectator.1 Based on prints of the columns published by Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778) between 1774–9, this drawing shows the bottom portion of the Column of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus in Piazza Colonna, while Diagram 5 (Tate D17123; Turner Bequest CXCV 152) depicts a view of the top. Finberg mistook these diagrams for views of Trajan’s Column.
For other derivations from Piranesi among the lecture diagrams see Tate D17090, D17091, D17099; Turner Bequest CXCV 120, 121, 128, based on his prison scenes, and D17124; Turner Bequest CXCV 102, probably derived from his views of Paestum.
1
Turner, ‘Royal Academy Lectures’, circa 1807–38, Department of Western Manuscripts, British Library, London, ADD MS 46151 C folio 8 verso–9, K folio 9 verso–10 and J folio 8 verso–9 verso.
Technical notes:
Peter Bower states that the sheet is Colombier size paper made by William Lepard, Hamper Mill, Watford, Hertfordshire.1
1
Notes in Tate catalogue files.
Verso:
Blank, save for an inscription by an unknown hand in pencil ‘144’ bottom left.

Andrea Fredericksen
June 2004

Supported by The Samuel H. Kress Foundation

Revised by David Blayney Brown
January 2012

How to cite

Andrea Fredericksen, ‘Lecture Diagram 3: Lower Part of the Column of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, Rome c.1810 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2004, revised by David Blayney Brown, January 2012, 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-lecture-diagram-3-lower-part-of-the-column-of-marcus-r1136460, accessed 16 April 2024.