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 Sketches of the Coast Between Sorrento and Vico Equense 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Sketches of the Coast Between Sorrento and Vico Equense’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 66 Recto:
Sketches of the Coast Between Sorrento and Vico Equense 1819
D15859
Turner Bequest CLXXXV 65
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Cave Sorr’ top right of bottom right-hand sketch
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘278’ top right, ascending right-hand edge and ‘65’ top left, ascending left-hand edge
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXV 65’ top right, ascending right-hand edge
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner made a sequence of sketches of the Sorrentine peninsula from the sea. The studies on this page are all views of the coast between Sorrento and Vico Equense. The uppermost drawing represents the steep cliff of Punta Scutolo below Montechiaro. The second and third scenes from the top both show the town of Vico Equense. The first depicts the cathedral overlooking the sea with the historic watch-tower on the beach to the right below, whilst the second is taken from slightly further west with the Castello Giusso on the edge of the cliffs above the free-standing rock known as the Scoglio della Margherita. Visible amidst the hills in the distance is the monastery of San Francesco. For related views of Vico Equense see folios 61 verso–63 verso and 65 verso (D15850–D15854 and D15858; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 60a–62a and 64a). The two views at the bottom depict a grotto somewhere along the coastline which the artist has inscribed ‘cave Sor[rento]’.

Nicola Moorby
November 2010

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Sketches of the Coast Between Sorrento and Vico Equense 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, November 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-of-the-coast-between-sorrento-and-vico-equense-r1138328, accessed 26 April 2024.