Joseph Mallord William Turner The Basilica of Constantine from the Farnese Gardens on the Palatine Hill, Rome 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner,
The Basilica of Constantine from the Farnese Gardens on the Palatine Hill, Rome
1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
The Basilica of Constantine from the Farnese Gardens on the Palatine Hill, Rome 1819
D16356
Turner Bequest CLXXXIX 30
Turner Bequest CLXXXIX 30
Watercolour, gouache, pencil and grey watercolour wash on white wove paper, 234 x 369 mm
Inscribed by an unknown hand in blue ink ‘F 3’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXIX 30’ bottom right
Inscribed by an unknown hand in blue ink ‘F 3’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXIX 30’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Exhibition history
1904
National Gallery, London, various dates to at least 1904 (332).
1938
[Display of Watercolours], National Gallery, London, December 1938–September 1939 (no catalogue).
1938
Four Screens, British Museum, London, March–September 1938 (no catalogue).
1947
Turner 1775–1851: Tentoonstelling in het Stedelijk Museum te Amsterdam georganiseerd door de Tate Gallery voor de British Council, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, 1947 (49).
1947
William Turner 1775–1851: Die Ausstellung wurde von der Tate Gallery für den British Council organisiert, Berner Kunstmuseum, Bern, December 1947–February 1948 (49).
1948
Turner 1775–1851: Exposition de peintures organisée par la Tate Gallery pour le British Council, Musée de l’Orangerie, Paris, circa March 1948 (49).
1948
Turner 1775–1851: Tentoonstelling van schilderijen ingericht door de Tate Gallery voor The British Council in het Ministerie van Openbaar Onderwijs van Belgie, Palais voor Schone Kunst, Brussels and Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Liège, March–April 1948 (49).
1950
Aquarelle aus dem Turner-Nachlass im Britischen Museum veranstaltet vom British Council, Düsseldorf, Wiesbaden, Mannheim, Munich, Nuremberg, September/October 1950–March 1951, September 1951–10 April 1952 (8).
1961
J.W.M. [sic] Turner 1775–1851: Watercolours: On Loan to the National Gallery of Victoria on the Occasion of its Centenary from the Turner Bequest by Courtesy of the Trustees and Director of the British Museum, London, with the Assistance of the British Council, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, September–October 1961, National Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, October–November 1961 (10, reproduced).
1965
[Display of watercolours from the Turner Bequest], Tate Gallery, London, ?–[?]March 1965 (no catalogue).
1987
Watercolours from the Turner Bequest, Tate Gallery, London, April–October 1987 (no catalogue).
1992
Turner and Byron, Tate Gallery, London, June–September 1992 (101, reproduced).
1996
Imagining Rome: British Artists and Rome in the Nineteenth Century, City Museum and Art Gallery, Bristol, May–June 1996 (4, reproduced).
2000
Pure as Italian Air: Turner and Claude Lorrain, Tate Britain, London, November 2000–April 2001 (no catalogue).
2002
Turner et le Lorrain, Musée des beaux-arts, Nancy, December 2002–March 2003 (47, reproduced in colour).
2008
Turner e l’Italia/Turner and Italy, Palazzo dei Diamanti, Ferrara, November 2008–February 2009, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh, March–June 2009 (47, reproduced in colour).
2009
Turner és Itália, Szépmuvészeti Múzeum, Budapest, July–October 2009 (no number, reproduced).
References
1904
E.T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn (eds.), Library Edition: The Works of John Ruskin: Volume XIII: Turner: The Harbours of England; Catalogues and Notes, London 1904, no.332, pp.379 note 2, 624, as ‘Foreground in Rome’.
1909
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.I, p.563, as ‘Foreground in Rome. Water colour. 332, N.G.’.
1920
D[ugald] S[utherland] MacColl, National Gallery, Millbank: Catalogue: Turner Collection, London 1920, p.88.
1925
Thomas Ashby, Turner’s Visions of Rome, London and New York 1925, p.26, reproduced between pp.18–19 pl.15, as ‘Foreground in Rome’.
1961
J. Isaacs, J.W.M. [sic] Turner 1775–1851: Watercolours: On Loan to the National Gallery of Victoria on the Occasion of its Centenary from the Turner Bequest by Courtesy of the Trustees and Director of the British Museum, London, with the Assistance of the British Council, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne 1961, no.10, reproduced [p.11], as ‘Rome: The Farnese Gardens and Basilica of Constantine’.
1974
Gerald Wilkinson, The Sketches of Turner, R.A. 1802–20: Genius of the Romantic, London 1974, reproduced in colour, p.188 top, as ‘Rome’.
1975
Gerald Wilkinson, Turner’s Colour Sketches 1820–34, London 1975, p.18.
1977
Gerald Wilkinson, Turner Sketches 1789–1820, London 1977, p.156 reproduced in colour, as ‘Rome.’.
1987
Cecilia Powell, Turner in the South: Rome, Naples, Florence, New Haven and London 1987, p.50, reproduced p.28 colour pl.6, as ‘View from the Palatine’.
1992
David Blayney Brown, Turner and Byron, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1992, p.128 no.101 reproduced, as ‘Ruins in Rome: View from the Palatine’.
1996
Michael Liversidge and Catherine Edwards, Imagining Rome: British Artists and Rome in the Nineteenth Century, exhibition catalogue, City Museum and Art Gallery, Bristol 1996, pp.75–6 no.4, reproduced, as ‘Rome. View from the Palatine’.
2002
Ian Warrell, Blandine Chavanne and Michael Kitson, Turner et le Lorrain, exhibition catalogue, Musée des beaux-arts, Nancy 2002, pp.102–3, 192, no.47 reproduced in colour, as ‘Ruines à Rome: vue du Palatin / Ruins in Rome: view from the Palatine’.
2008
James Hamilton, Nicola Moorby, Christopher Baker and others, Turner e l’Italia, exhibition catalogue, Palazzo dei Diamanti, Ferrara 2008, no.47, pp.49, [179], 187, reproduced in colour, as ‘Rovine di Roma. Veduta dal Palatino’.
2009
James Hamilton, Nicola Moorby, Christopher Baker and others, Turner & Italy, exhibition catalogue, National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh 2009, p.49, reproduced in colour pl.54 p.[50], as ‘Ruins in Rome: View from the Palatine’.
2009
Christopher Baker and James Hamilton, Turner és Itália, exhibition catalogue, Szépmuvészeti Múzeum, Budapest 2009, p.54, reproduced in colour, p.[50], fig.50.
The Palatine Hill was one of the most popular vantage points in Rome and Turner made a large number of studies recording views of the city seen in all directions. As Thomas Ashby first identified, this sketch depicts a vista seen from the Farnese Gardens (Orti Farnesiani sul Palatino), sixteenth-century gardens created by Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, on the northern side of the hill.1 On the left-hand side of the compostion are the open arcades of the two aviaries on the upper terrace of the gardens, and the viewer looks beyond these to the Basilica of Constantine in the Forum, and the adjacent Torre dei Milize. In the foreground Turner has depicted several pieces of ruined Roman masonry in ‘picturesque confusion’, including decorative marble capitals and broken column bases from the Imperial palaces of the Palatine.2 Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century visitors to Rome often commented upon the fragmentary remains of buildings and sculptures which could be seen scattered around the city, and Charlotte Eaton described the Farnese Gardens as ‘casinos of Popes mouldering upon the palaces of Roman emperors’.3 Turner’s inclusion of them here is reminiscent of the aesthetic properties of celebrated views by Piranesi,4 and Claude Lorrain.5 David Blayney Brown has suggested that the drawing captures the sense of awe and desolation experienced by Romantic tourists cognisant with Byron’s description of Rome in Canto IV of his epic poem, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, as the ‘Lone mother of dead empires’ with ‘steps of broken thrones and temples’.6
Like many drawings within the Rome C. Studies sketchbook, the composition has been executed over a washed grey background. Turner started with a basic outline in pencil before partially developing the scene in watercolour. The colour he has added, described by John Ruskin as ‘divinest’,7 is naturalistic and local, and his handling of the paint is largely loose and free. As Cecilia Powell has discussed, despite the freshness and vitality of the sketch it is unlikely to have been painted en plein air since this was not a practice which the artist generally undertook (see the general introduction to the sketchbook).8 Related views can be found on other pages from this book (see Tate D16346, D16369, D16382, D16394; Turner Bequest CLXXXIX 20, 42, 53, 62a).
Verso:
Blank; inscribed by an unknown hand in pencil ‘CLXXXIX. 30’ bottom centre, and stamped in black ‘CLXXXIX 30’ bottom centre.
Nicola Moorby
October 2009
How to cite
Nicola Moorby, ‘The Basilica of Constantine from the Farnese Gardens on the Palatine Hill, Rome 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, October 2009, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www