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    "Booth Notes Doc. 8" Is linked to these Works of Art
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    The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa…

    The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa…
    The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa…
    The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa…
    Gloucester City Museum and Art Gallery
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    Artist
    Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)
    Title
    The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli, Italy)
    Date
    c.1765
    Medium
    Oil on canvas
    Dimensions
    Metric: 43.8 x 35 cm [sight size]
    Imperial: 17 1/4 x 13 3/4 in. [sight size]
    Collection
    Gloucester City Museum and Art Gallery. To license images click here.
    Accession Number
    00305
    Wilson Online Reference
    P138C
    Description
    A landscape with a white dwelling on two arches in the foreground, with two figures and goats
    Exhibited
    RA Old Masters 1882 (32 - Strada Nomentana); London, Grosvenor Gallery 1885; Brighton 1920 (2 or 34 - Strada Nomentana); Birmingham 1948-9 (43); London 1949 (42); Gloucester 2014 (unnumbered); Croome 2019
    Provenance
    Richard Hulse (1727-1805), Blackheath; Benjamin Booth; Revd. R.S. Booth; Lady Ford; Richard Ford; Sir F. Clare Ford; Captain Richard Ford, sold Christie's 14 June 1929 (24 - Strada Nomentana or Villa Adriana), bt with a black and white drawing of the subject by Spink (520 guineas); Stanley Marling, Amberley, Gloucester; bequeathed to Gloucester City Museum and Art Gallery 1963
    Signature/inscription
    Signed in monogram lower right: RW [the R inverted]
    Labels
    [1] Verso upper left print and typescript exhibition label: Cheltenham Twenty-first Literary Festival [...] Exhibition at Cheltenham Art Gallery | Fine Paintings from Gloucestershire Houses and other Sources | 5th to 17th July 1965 | Catalogue No. 35
    [2] Verso upper centre manuscript [K. Garlick, Birmingham]: Wilson | Hadrian's Villa | Lent by S. Marling Esq.
    [3] Verso lower centre on horizontal stretcher member manuscript and printed: Christie's | June 14th | 1929 | RICHARD WILSON, R.A. | 24 STRADA NOMENTANA, OR VILLA ADRIANA | A landscape, with a white villa on two red arches; two | figures and goats in the foreground | 17 1/2 in. by 13 3/4 in. | Exhibited at Burlington House, 1882 | Exhibited at the Grosvenor Gallery 1885 | A black and white drawing of this subject, by the artist, | is sold with the picture | 43
    [4] Verso right corner of lower horizontal stretcher, ink: 96
    [5] Verso lower right partly obliterated and illegible typescript
    Subject
    The spectacular site of Tivoli was familiar to all travellers on the Grand Tour through the Roman poets, especially Virgil and Horace. It was also a favourite sketching-ground for artists from the 17th century onwards, a tradition that deeply influenced Wilson. Hadrian's Villa was a complex of palaces, baths, temples, libraries, state rooms and service quarters, which included the greatest Roman example of the Alexandrine garden, recreating a sacred landscape. Built as a retreat for the Emperor Hadrian (76-138 AD) it fell into ruins over the ages. Recently the precise location has been identified by Jonathan Yarker as the West Belvedere of the Villa with a farmhouse above built by Sebastiano Soliardi.
    Related Drawings
    D170 The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea
    D170A Hadrian's Villa, Gloucester City Museum and Art Gallery
    Related Prints
    E42 Michael 'Angelo' Rooker after Wilson In the Villa Adriana Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection, New Haven and other impressions
    E80 Celia Lucy Brightwell after Wilson Hadrian's Villa, The British Museum and other impressions
    E83 James Carter after Wilson, Hadrian's Villa The British Museum and other impressions
    Versions
    See 'Links' tab
    Related Works by Other Artists
    Giovanni Battista Piranesi made plans of the villa and engraved buildings and sculpture there. The site was also recorded by Robert Adam, Charles-Louis Clerisseau and other near-contemporaries of Wilson.
    Previous Cat/Ref Nos
    Art 305
    Bibliography
    Booth Notes Doc. 8; Booth Notes Doc. 9 (15); WGC, p. 200 pl. 80b (version 2)
    Link to WG Constable Archive Record
    WGC/1/1/107
    Condition/Conservation
    Dimensions framed: 64.2 x 55 cm (25 1/4 x 21 5/8in.) Relined. This painting is in good condition and cleaner than P137A The Villa of Maecenas at Tivoli, Gloucester City Museum and Art Gallery. Treated by Miss S.Wood 1976. Surveyed by Area Museum Service in 1997.
    Kate Lowry has noted: Convincing building, sky and figures. Under UV no retouches were visible.
    Updated by Compiler
    15/11/2021

    Work of Art

    Drawings

    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782), The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Part of the Ruins of Hadrian's Villa), Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea
    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782), Hadrian's Villa, Gloucester City Museum and Art Gallery

    Prints

    • Michael 'Angelo' Rooker (1746-1801) after Wilson, Twelve Etchings of Views in Italy - In the Villa Adriana, Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection, New Haven
    • Michael 'Angelo' Rooker after Wilson, In the Villa Adriana, The British Museum
    • Michael 'Angelo' Rooker after Wilson, In the Villa Adriana, The British Museum
    • Michael 'Angelo' Rooker after Wilson, In the Villa Adriana, The British Museum
    • Michael 'Angelo' Rooker after WIlson, In the Villa Adriana, Royal Academy of Arts, London
    • Michael 'Angelo' Rooker after Wilson, In the Villa Adriana, National Museum Wales, Cardiff
    • Celia Lucy Brightwell (1811-1875) after Wilson, Hadrian's Villa, The British Museum
    • Celia Lucy Brightwell after Wilson, Hadrian's Villa, Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery
    • James Carter (1798-1855) after Wilson, Hadrian's Villa, The British Museum

    Versions

    • Ascribed to Wilson, The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa), Private Collection, England
    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) The West Belvedere, Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli, Private Collection, England
    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa), Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection, New Haven
    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (View in the Ruins of Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli), Tate, London
    • Studio of Wilson, The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (The Ruins of Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli), Magdalen College, Oxford
    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) The West Belvedere at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli (Hadrian's Villa), Old Westbury Gardens, New York

    Exhibitions

    • Birmingham City Art Gallery, 17 November 1948 - 9 January 1949
    • London, Tate Gallery, 22 January - 14 March 1949
    • Brighton, Fine Art Galleries, 28 February - 2 May 1920
    • Gloucester City Museum & Art Gallery, 2 January - 1 March 2014
    • Croome Court, Worcestershire, 15 February - 31 December 2019

    Biographies

    • Benjamin Booth (1732-1807)
    • Richard Ford (1796-1858)
    • Richard Hulse (1727-1805)
    • Stanley Marling (1864-1963)
    • The Revd Richard Salwey Booth (1762-1807)
    • Marianne Booth, Lady Ford (1767-1849)
    • Captain Richard Ford (1860-1940)

    Documents

    • William George Constable, Richard Wilson
    • Benjamin Booth, Unpublished Notes, Document 8: List of Wilson's Paintings and Works by Old Masters and other Artists in Booth's Collection
    • Benjamin Booth, Unpublished Notes, Document 9: List of Wilson's Landscapes with Sizes and former Owners
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