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    Return to "London 1993" is linked to these Works 3 items
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    Lake Avernus and the Island of Capri

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    Lake Avernus and the Island of Capri
    Lake Avernus and the Island of Capri
    Lake Avernus and the Island of Capri
    Tate, London 2014
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    Artist
    Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)
    Title
    Lake Avernus and the Island of Capri
    Date
    c.1760 (undated)
    Medium
    Oil on canvas
    Dimensions
    Metric: 47 x 72.4 cm
    Imperial: 18 1/2 x 28 1/2 in.
    Collection
    Tate, London. To license image, click here.
    Accession Number
    N00304
    Wilson Online Reference
    P93A
    Description
    The view is taken from a classic vantage point west of Pozzuoli, looking south across Lake Avernus, the Lucrine Lake behind and the narrow isthmus dividing the latter from the Bay of Baiae. In the background are the island of Capri, and on the extreme left, Vesuvius.
    Exhibited
    Bangor 1925 (64); Machynlleth 1937 (6); London, Cardiff and New Haven, 1982-83 (90); London, Accademia Italiana delle Arti 27 October - 27 November 1990, In the Shadow of Vesuvius, Views of Naples from Baroque to Romanticism (60, repr.); London 1993 (75, repr.); London 1996-97 (100)
    Provenance
    Sir John Pringle sale, Christie's 20 April 1843 (49), bt Norton (£78.15.0); probably acquired through the dealer Norton by Robert Vernon; presented by him to the National Gallery 1847; transferred to Tate 1955
    Subject
    Lake Avernus, to the west on Naples, near Pozzuoli, lies in the volcanic region of the Phlegraean ('Burning') Fields. In classical mythology this was the site of the Underworld or 'Hades'. The entrance to Hades was said to lie in a nearby grotto, inhabited by the prophetess known as the Cumaean Sibyl. In Virgil's epic poem, The Aeneid, the Sibyl helps Aeneas, the Trojan prince, to enter Hades. There his father's ghost foretells his destiny as the founder of the Roman nation. Such associations made Lake Avernus a major attraction for landscape artists and travellers on the Grand Tour. The semi-ruined Temple of Apollo on the eastern shore of the lake to the left, was believed in Wilson's day to have been dedicated to Juno or Proserpina. In the left foreground is the cavern of the Cumaean Sibyl.
    Related Drawings
    D257 Lake Avernus, Monte Nuovo, the Island of Capri and Part of Baiae, The British Museum
    Related Prints
    E85 Joseph Clayton Bentley after Wilson, Lake Avernus, The British Museum
    E85A Joseph Clayton Bentley after Wilson, Lake Avernus, National Museum Wales, Cardiff
    Versions
    See 'Links' tab
    Related Works by Other Artists
    [1] J.M.W. Turner, Aeneas and the Sibyl, Lake Avernus, c. 1798, Tate, London (N00463)
    [2] Giovanni Battista Lusieri, View of Lake Averno, watercolour, 1786, Christie's New York, 29 January 2015 (112)
    Critical commentary
    D257 or another version of it served as the basis for this painting. Robin Hamlyn noted that the association of the area with Apollo, to whom, on first landing in Italy, Aeneas vowed to build a temple, was reinforced by Wilson's showing the sun setting behind the temple; also that in the distance, beyond the Lucrine Lake, the presence of vessels pulled up on the shore almost seems a conscious evocation of the moment when Aeneas's fleet landed.
    Previous Cat/Ref Nos
    304
    Bibliography
    Davies 1946, pp. 176-77, cat. 304; WGC, pp. 82, 195, pl. 72a; Herrmann 1973, p. 60, pl. 57; Hamlyn 1993, pp. 65-66; Solkin 1982, pp. 203-204
    Link to WG Constable Archive Record
    WGC/1/1/79
    More Information
    Between 1752 and 1756 Wilson visited the area two or three times, working mainly out of doors around the Bay of Pozzuoli and at Lakes Agnano and Avernus.
    Condition/Conservation
    Dimensions framed: 77 x 101.5 cm
    Updated by Compiler
    2021-03-05 00:00:00

    Work of Art

    Drawings

    • Lake Avernus, Monte Nuovo, the Island of Capri and Part of Baiae, The British Museum

    Prints

    • Joseph Clayton Bentley after Wilson, Lake Avernus, The British Museum
    • Joseph Clayton Bentley after Wilson, Lake Avernus, National Museum Wales, Cardiff

    Versions

    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) Lake Avernus and the Island of Capri, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea

    Exhibitions

    • London, Tate Gallery, Cardiff, National Museum of Wales, and New Haven, Conn., Yale Center for British Art, 3 November 1982 - 19 June 1983
    • Bangor, University College of North Wales, 4 April - 23 May 1925
    • London, Tate Gallery, 16 March - 31 October 1993
    • Tate Gallery, London and Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome, 10 October 1996 - 5 January 1997 and 5 February - 7 April 1997
    • Machynlleth, Wales, 26 July - 14 August 1937

    Biographies

    • Robert Vernon (1774-1849)

    Documents

    • William George Constable, Richard Wilson
    • David Solkin, Richard Wilson: The Landscape of Reaction
    • Robin Hamlyn, Robert Vernon's Gift: British Art for the Nation 1847
    • Martin Davies, National Gallery Catalogues: The British School
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