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 > Naples, Paestum and Rome Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Sketches from Salerno of Vietri sul Mare and the Plain of Paestum 1819

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Sketches from Salerno of Vietri sul Mare and the Plain of Paestum’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 37 Recto:
Sketches from Salerno of Vietri sul Mare and the Plain of Paestum 1819
D15980
Turner Bequest CLXXXVI 35
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Pestum’ top centre
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in red ink ‘35’ top right and ‘245’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXVI 35’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Both of the sketches on this page appear to represent views from Salerno of the bay of the same name. The upper vista records the sweeping curve of the coastline to the east with the Lattari mountains beyond and Turner has marked the relative position of the plain of Paestum. The lower study meanwhile the view looking west with a distant view of Vietri sul Mare. Nearest to the foreground is the Torre Crestarella, one of a number of medieval watch-towers which are dotted along the length of the Amalfi coast.1 A small part of the composition spills over onto the opposite sheet of the double-page spread, see folio 36 verso (D15979; Turner Bequest CLXXXVI 34a).
As a young man, Turner made a copy of a similar watercolour composition by another artist, probably John Robert Cozens (1752–1797), see Dr Monro’s Album of Italian Views (Tate D36471; Turner Bequest CCCLXXIII 58).2

Nicola Moorby
July 2010

1
See for example views in a 1793 sketchbook (Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester) by John Robert Cozens (1752–1797), reproduced in Anthony Blunt, Catalogue of Seven Sketch-Books by John Robert Cozens, Sothebys, London 1973, vol.III, nos.11, 12, 15, 16, 18.
2
See ibid., vol.III, no.3.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Sketches from Salerno of Vietri sul Mare and the Plain of Paestum 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-sketches-from-salerno-of-vietri-sul-mare-and-the-plain-of-r1137904, accessed 25 April 2024.