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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Part of a View of ?Mergellina from Naples; and ?Ships in the Port at Naples 1819

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 15 Verso:
Part of a View of ?Mergellina from Naples; and ?Ships in the Port at Naples 1819
D15937
Turner Bequest CLXXXVI 15 a
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
There are two (or possibly three) distinct components on this sketchbook page. On the right-hand side is part of a landscape view of distant coastline, probably Mergellina seen from Naples with the Posillipo Hill beyond. The central foreground building is unidentified and it is not clear whether this is part of the same vista, or a separate study. The composition continues on the opposite sheet of the double-page spread, see folio 16 (D15938).
The rough, schematic details on the far left-hand side of the page appear to depict ships docked within a port or harbour, possibly in front of the Castel Nuovo in Naples.

Nicola Moorby
July 2010

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Part of a View of ?Mergellina from Naples; and ?Ships in the Port at 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-part-of-a-view-of-mergellina-from-naples-and-ships-in-the-r1137861, accessed 28 March 2024.