Joseph Mallord William Turner Details of the Decorations of Raphael's Loggia in the Vatican: The Second and Third Piers, the Balustrade and the Floor 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 21 Recto:
Details of the Decorations of Raphael’s Loggia in the Vatican: The Second and Third Piers, the Balustrade and the Floor 1819
D14965
Turner Bequest CLXXIX 21
Turner Bequest CLXXIX 21
Pencil on white wove paper, 186 x 112 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil with various notes on the loggia decorations [see main catalogue entry]
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘21’ top left, ascending left-hand edge
Stamped in black ‘CLXXIX 21’ top right, ascending left-hand edge
Inscribed by the artist in pencil with various notes on the loggia decorations [see main catalogue entry]
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘21’ top left, ascending left-hand edge
Stamped in black ‘CLXXIX 21’ top right, ascending left-hand edge
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
References
1909
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.I, p.527 as ‘Details of decorations of the Logge’.
1965
Jerrold Ziff, ‘Copies of Claude’s Paintings in the Sketch Books of J.M.W. Turner, Gazette des beaux-arts, vol.65, January 1965, pp.56, 64 note 24.
1974
Martin Butlin, Andrew Wilton and John Gage, Turner 1775–1851, exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy, London 1974, p.92 under no.236.
1979
Andrew Wilton, The Life and Work of J.M.W. Turner, Fribourg 1979, p.147.
1982
Evelyn Joll and Martin Butlin, L’opera completa di Turner 1793–1829, Classici dell’arte, Milan 1982, p.107 under no.228.
1982
Cecilia Powell, ‘Exhibition Review: Turner’s First Visit to Italy in 1819’, Turner Studies, Summer 1982, vol.2, no.1, p.48.
1984
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, p.137 under no.228.
1984
Cecilia Powell, ‘Turner on Classic Ground: His Visits to Central and Southern Italy and Related Paintings and Drawings’, unpublished Ph.D thesis, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London 1984, pp.148, 151 note 2, 235.
1987
Robert E. McVaugh, ‘Turner and Rome, Raphael and the Fornarina’, Studies in Romanticism, no.26, Autumn 1987, pp.371–2.
1987
Cecilia Powell, Turner in the South: Rome, Naples, Florence, New Haven and London 1987, p.65 note 1.
1997
James Hamilton, Turner: A Life, London 1997, p.205 note 1.
1998
James Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1998, p.68.
2008
James Hamilton, Nicola Moorby, Christopher Baker and others, Turner e l’Italia, exhibition catalogue, Palazzo dei Diamanti, Ferrara 2008, pp.49 and 91 note 68.
2009
James Hamilton, Nicola Moorby, Christopher Baker and others, Turner & Italy, exhibition catalogue, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh 2009, pp.49, 151 note 69.
2009
Ian Warrell, ‘Painters Painted: The Cult of the Artist’, in David Solkin (ed.), Turner and the Masters, exhibition catalogue, Tate Britain, London 2009, p.229 note 1 under no.63.
2010
David Solkin and Guillaume Faroult (eds.), Turner et ses peintres, exhibition catalogue, Galeries nationales, Grand Palais, Paris 2010, pp.196, 262 note 12.
2011
Nicola Moorby, ‘Turner’s Sketches for “Rome from the Vatican”: Some Recent Discoveries’, Turner Society News, no.115, Spring 2011, pp.5, 6, 10 notes 16 and 20, reproduced fig.4.
One of the most significant series of studies dating from Turner’s 1819 trip to Rome was the sequence of on-the-spot pencil sketches relating to the Loggia of Raphael in the Vatican. The drawings on this page relate to Turner’s recreation of the loggia on the right-hand side of his oil painting, Rome from the Vatican. Raffaelle Accompanied by La Fornarina, Preparing his Pictures for the Decoration of the Loggia exhibited 1820 (Tate, N00503).1 They depict the stucco decorations from the arches above the second and third external piers of the loggia (i.e. the pillars between the first and second, and second and third windows from the end), arranged in four distinct groups, from top to bottom:
a
The sketches at the top of the page depicts the external (window) and transverse (vault) arches (intrados) above the second external pier, identifiable from the details of the stucco panels.2 Turner has inscribed the study ‘2 arch arch’.
The sketches at the top of the page depicts the external (window) and transverse (vault) arches (intrados) above the second external pier, identifiable from the details of the stucco panels.2 Turner has inscribed the study ‘2 arch arch’.
b
The sketches across the centre of the page represent the top of the third external pier comprising the spandrel, and the external and transverse arches (intrados).3 Turner has made thumbnail studies of the stucco decorations, including on the left, a seated man and Bacchus and Ariadne, from the exterior (window) arch,4 and on the right, centaurs, and Oreste and Erinni from the transverse arch.5 He has also transcribed the Latin inscription ‘LXPM’ [Leo X Pontificus Maximus]’ twice from the exterior arch, and noted ‘[?Dead] End’ on the panel in between.
The sketches across the centre of the page represent the top of the third external pier comprising the spandrel, and the external and transverse arches (intrados).3 Turner has made thumbnail studies of the stucco decorations, including on the left, a seated man and Bacchus and Ariadne, from the exterior (window) arch,4 and on the right, centaurs, and Oreste and Erinni from the transverse arch.5 He has also transcribed the Latin inscription ‘LXPM’ [Leo X Pontificus Maximus]’ twice from the exterior arch, and noted ‘[?Dead] End’ on the panel in between.
c
Along the centre left-hand edge is a careful study of one of the double moulded shafts of the balustrade beneath the windows of the loggia.
Along the centre left-hand edge is a careful study of one of the double moulded shafts of the balustrade beneath the windows of the loggia.
d
The sketches in the bottom right-hand corner represent the sections of the interlacing and arabesque patterned floor of the loggia.6 Turner has variously annotated the studies with colour notes including ‘G Ybr’, ‘W’, ‘Y’, ‘B’, ‘Yellow’, ‘[?Darker] | M’, ‘[?Plinth 8]’, ‘G’, ‘G’, ‘Yell | P | WS’, ‘[?B...] Squares’, ‘Blue in the M[...]’, ‘Y’, ‘L’, ‘B’, ‘Y’ and ‘W Band’. The paving was originally of glazed majolica but these were removed in 1890 and replaced with grey marble slabs.7
The sketches in the bottom right-hand corner represent the sections of the interlacing and arabesque patterned floor of the loggia.6 Turner has variously annotated the studies with colour notes including ‘G Ybr’, ‘W’, ‘Y’, ‘B’, ‘Yellow’, ‘[?Darker] | M’, ‘[?Plinth 8]’, ‘G’, ‘G’, ‘Yell | P | WS’, ‘[?B...] Squares’, ‘Blue in the M[...]’, ‘Y’, ‘L’, ‘B’, ‘Y’ and ‘W Band’. The paving was originally of glazed majolica but these were removed in 1890 and replaced with grey marble slabs.7
It has been widely suggested that Turner thought of the idea for Rome from the Vatican whilst he was actually sketching in situ.8 Further studies relating to the evolution of the painting can be found on folios 13 verso–20, 21 verso and 25–26 (D14955–D14964, D14966 and D14970–D14972), as well as an elaborate compositional drawing in pen and ink in the Rome C. Studies sketchbook (Tate D16368; Turner Bequest CLXXXIX 41). For a full description of the loggia and Turner’s sketches see folio 14 (D14956).
Nicola Moorby
January 2010
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, no.228.
See the transverse vault stuccos of cavalry and a battling man and centaur in Nicole Dacos, Le Logge di Rafaello: Maestro e bottega di fronte all’antico, Rome 1977, reproduced Tav.LXV as ‘c) Sottarco II.C’ and ‘b) Sottarco II.B’.
See the reproduction of the third vault in Dacos 1977, Tav.IV, as ‘Volta III – Veduta d’insieme’, and also visible in Tav.LVIII, ‘Pennacchi IV.4’.
See ibid., reproduced Tav.LXVII, as ‘b) Sottarco III.A, esterno’, ‘c) Sottarco III.B, esterno’, and ‘d) Sottarco III.C, esterno’.
Ibid., reproduced Tav.CXLV, as ‘b) Pavimento delle Logge – Particolare di una composizione, dal disegno di F. La Vega. Biblioteca Vaticana’.
Nicole Dacos, The Loggia of Raphael: A Vatican Art Treasure, New York and London 2008, pp.15 and 330 note 6.
See Powell 1987, pp.62 and 116–7, and Hamilton et al. 2009, p.53. Hamilton, for example, has described the studies as ‘far more detailed than [Turner] would reasonably need if he were not sympathetic to, and even complicit in, a complete copying of them’ and has stated that the artist only ‘used a fraction’ of them.
How to cite
Nicola Moorby, ‘Details of the Decorations of Raphael’s Loggia in the Vatican: The Second and Third Piers, the Balustrade and the Floor 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, January 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www