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    An Italian Landscape, Morning (River…

    An Italian Landscape, Morning (River…
    An Italian Landscape, Morning (River…
    An Italian Landscape, Morning (River…
    Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
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    Artist
    Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)
    Title
    An Italian Landscape, Morning (River, Sea-Coast and circular Ruin) (The Temple of Venus at Baiae)
    Date
    c.1760-65 (undated)
    Medium
    Oil on canvas
    Dimensions
    Metric: 70.2 x 94.6 cm
    Imperial: 27 5/8 x 37 1/4 in.
    Collection
    Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection, New Haven. To license images click here
    Accession Number
    B1981.25.690
    Wilson Online Reference
    P92B
    Description
    A classical landscape, with a man and two women conversing by a lake or river on which two boats are sailing. In the left foreground on a high bank stands an open sarcophagus with antique medallion motif. To the right are two arches of a ruined bridge with a ruined circular building above and behind. A carefully observed group of buildings with a campanile appear among trees to the left before a mountain in the distance.
    Exhibited
    Royal Academy, Old Masters, 1903 (10); Birmingham 1948-49 (14); London 1949 (13); New Haven 1981 (82); Tercentenary 2014 (100)
    Provenance
    Sir Francis Cook 1st Bart (1817-1901), Doughty House, Richmond; by descent to Sir Francis Ferdinand Maurice Cook, 4th Bart (1907-1978); Thomas Agnew & Sons, from whom purchased 1965 by Paul Mellon
    Signature/inscription
    Unsigned; no inscription
    Techniques and materials
    Unusual for this period in its high tonality and for the coloured shadow of the standing woman. The impastoed reinforcement of the clouds is intrusive as the dark clouds by the horizon are flat. There are many impastoed foreground details. The trees at the right are painted over spaces but the sky has been left as space round the branches. Sky spaces have also been left and then reinforced under the arches. The tower and tree at the left are painted over the horizon. The descending horizon of the sky is normal for Wilson. The figures are quite well articulated and the sheen on the water is good. A lot of underpainting is showing through at the right. There are no birds in the large expanse of the sky but the foreground is detailed.
    Labels
    [1] Agnew's label on stretcher: No. 400
    [2] '48' in chalk
    [3] PM 1723
    Subject
    The exact location of the view has been much debated and the scene is almost certainly a capriccio centred on the so-called Temple of Venus at Baia near Naples (see Critical Commentary below). The marble sarcophagus in the foreground is very much an invention of Wilson's and cannot be considered conventional in form, with its square shape, flat open top and oval decoration.
    Related Drawings
    D271 Bay of Baiae - Temple of Venus, Victoria & Albert Museum (Dyce.647)
    Related Prints
    E64 William Pengree Sherlock, River, Sea-Coast and circular Ruin ('Morning'), The British Museum (1873,0809.1415)
    E72/14 Thomas Hastings after Wilson, Temple of Venus with Part of the Bay of Baiae, The British Museum (1854,0708.71)
    E72/40 Thomas Hastings Landscape (River, Sea Coast and circular Ruin), 1824, The British Museum (1854,0708.97)
    E73 Samuel William Reynolds Morning, 1824, The British Museum (1879,0614.334) and other impressions
    Versions
    See 'Links' tab
    Related Works by Other Artists
    J.M.W. Turner The Bay of Baiae, with Apollo and the Sibyl, exh. 1823, Tate, London (N00505)
    Critical commentary
    The composition has been known under several titles, notably The Temple of Venus at Baiae but at first sight the temple does not seem to be the same building as in D271 or in the famous Turner painting of the Bay of Baiae in Tate, London (N00505). However, Robin Simon has recently observed that the building is in fact the same (actually baths rather than a temple) but seen from the opposite side, revealing the ruined open aspect of the structure. Another version, P92A River, Sea Coast and circular Ruin, Private Collection, England was mistakenly described as Vale of Narni when exhibited in 1925 at the Tate Gallery. The present work differs from both P92 and P92A in background details and the inclusion of two boats on the water.
    Previous Cat/Ref Nos
    Object ID: 71
    Bibliography
    M.W. Brockwell, Catalogue of the Pictures at Doughty House, Richmond, 1915, vol. 3, no. 403; Burlington Magazine, 1917, p. 118; WGC, pp. 217-18, 282, pl. 106a (version 1; image mistakenly used to illustrate P92A); Cormack 1985, pp. 252 & 253; Wilson and Europe 2014, p. 283
    Link to WG Constable Archive Record
    WGC/1/1/123
    More Information
    The title, An Italian Landscape, Morning, appears to date from 1824, when one version of the picture was engraved by S.W. Reynolds with the title Morning (E73A and other impressions).
    Condition/Conservation
    Contained in a rococo frame very close in design to that of P144 The White Monk - I, Toledo Museum of Art. Good condition but with slight vertical craquelure. Foreground figures slightly rubbed. Some adjustment made of mismatched retouching along top edge by Lance Mayer & Gay Myers.
    Updated by Compiler
    17/03/2021

    Work of Art

    Drawings

    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782), Bay of Baiae - Temple of Venus, Victoria & Albert Museum

    Prints

    • William Pengree Sherlock after Wilson, River, Sea-Coast and circular Ruin ('Morning'), The British Museum
    • Thomas Hastings after Wilson, Temple of Venus with Part of the Bay of Baiae, The British Museum
    • Thomas Hastings after Wilson, Landscape (River, Sea Coast and circular Ruin), The British Museum
    • Samuel William Reynolds after Wilson, Morning, The British Museum
    • Samuel William Reynolds after Wilson, Morning,The British Museum
    • Samuel William Reynolds after Wilson, Landscape with Ruins (Morning), Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge
    • Samuel William Reynolds after Wilson, Morning, National Museum Wales, Cardiff
    • Samuel William Reynolds after Wilson, Morning, Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery

    Versions

    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) River, Sea Coast and circular Ruin, Private Collection, England
    • Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782) An Italian Landscape, Morning (River, Sea Coast and circular Ruin), Private Collection, England

    Exhibitions

    • Birmingham City Art Gallery, 17 November 1948 - 9 January 1949
    • London, Tate Gallery, 22 January - 14 March 1949
    • New Haven, Yale Center for British Art, 29 July - 20 September 1981
    • New Haven, Yale Center for British Art & Cardiff, Amgueddfa Cymru - National Museum Wales, 6 March - 29 October 2014

    Biographies

    • Sir Francis Cook, 1st Baronet (1817-1901)
    • Paul Mellon (1907-1999)

    Documents

    • William George Constable, Richard Wilson
    • Martin Postle & Robin Simon, Richard Wilson and the Transformation of European Landscape Painting
    • Malcolm Cormack, A Concise Catalogue of Paintings in the Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
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