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 > Gandolfo to Naples Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner View of the Bay of Baiae seen from near the So-Called Temple of Mercury 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘View of the Bay of Baiae seen from near the So-Called Temple of Mercury’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 80 Recto:
View of the Bay of Baiae seen from near the So-Called Temple of Mercury 1819
D15713
Turner Bequest CLXXXIV 78
Pencil on white wove paper, 122 x 197 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Temple of Mercury’ bottom centre
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘281’ top left, inverted and ‘78’ bottom left, inverted
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXIV 78’ top left, inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
As Cecilia Powell first identified, this sketch represents part of a view of the Bay of Baiae seen from near the so-called of Temple of Mercury, a domed bath-house which is part of the ruins of a large Roman spa complex.1 The vista looks south-east across the bay towards the Posillipo coastline and the distant island of Nisida, whilst in the middle distance on the right is the Castello di Baia (Castle of Baiae). The composition spills over onto the opposite sheet of the double-page spread, see folio 79 verso (D15712; Turner Bequest CLXXXIV 77a). In the bottom right-hand corner of the page is part of a related study of the ruins.
Turner made a large number of sketches of Baiae and its ancient monuments, see folios 79 verso, 80 verso–81, 82, 84 verso–89 verso, 92 (D15712, D15714–D15715, D15717, D15722–D15732 and D15737; Turner Bequest CLXXXIV 77a, 78a–79, 80, 82a–87a and 90). These drawings formed the compositional basis of one of three oil paintings completed in the months and years following Turner’s return from his first tour of Italy, The Bay of Baiae, with Apollo and the Sibyl exhibited 1823 (Tate, N00505).2 Indeed the finished picture features a vista very similar to that depicted here and repeated within other on-the-spot drawings, and it is therefore possible that the artist was already planning the composition during his visit to the area.3

Nicola Moorby
June 2010

1
Powell 1984, p.425.
2
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, no.230.
3
Powell 1984, pp.188, 247–8 and Powell 1987, pp.83 and 120.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘View of the Bay of Baiae seen from near the So-Called Temple of Mercury 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 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-view-of-the-bay-of-baiae-seen-from-near-the-so-called-temple-r1138174, accessed 24 April 2024.