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 > Pompeii, Amalfi, &c., Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Amalfi from the Sea 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Amalfi from the Sea’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 54 Recto:
Amalfi from the Sea 1819
D15837
Turner Bequest CLXXXV 54
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘278’ bottom right and ‘54’ top right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXV 54’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The subject of this sketch is Amalfi, one of the most picturesque locations on the Amalfi coast. Turner’s viewpoint is from a boat on the sea, with the fishing port and harbour in the central foreground and the densely built town tucked in a valley between steep mountains beyond. On the summit of the slopes above is the Torre (Tower) di Poggerola. A small part of the composition spills over onto the opposite sheet of the double-page spread, see folio 53 verso (D15836).
Similar vistas of Amalfi can be found on folios 35 and 53 verso (D15803 and D15836, whilst views from the west can be seen on folios 54 verso–55 (D15838–D15839). The composition of this sketch is very similar to the prospect after John ‘Warwick’ Smith (1749–1831) which Turner copied into the Italian Guide Book sketchbook (Tate D13971; Turner Bequest CLXXII 21a). It is also comparable to a later pair of views dating from the 1840s by John Ruskin (1819–1900).1

Nicola Moorby
October 2010

1
Amalfi, pencil and watercolour, 1841 (Ruskin Library, University of Lancaster) and Amalfi, pencil and watercolour, 1844 (Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University). Reproduced in Robert Hewison, Ruskin, Turner and the Pre-Raphaelites, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 2000, nos.48, 49, p.72.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Amalfi from the Sea 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, October 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-amalfi-from-the-sea-r1138304, accessed 27 April 2024.