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Italy: Naples (or vicinity). View of an overgrown and ruined circular building, seen through an arch, showing the broken walls of two vaulted stories, with another on top. In the foreground is vegetation and architectural fragments.
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Reference number
Adam vol.57/12
Purpose
Italy: Naples (or vicinity). View of an overgrown and ruined circular building, seen through an arch, showing the broken walls of two vaulted stories, with another on top. In the foreground is vegetation and architectural fragments.
Aspect
Perspective
Inscribed
Inscribed in pencil in a contemporary hand Naples; in ink 12
Signed and dated
- Undated, probably 1755.
Medium and dimensions
Pencil, ink, with brown, grey and blue washes 303 x 508 (four sheets joined together)
Hand
Charles-Louis Clérisseau
Verso
Grey wash brush try outs on the upper two sheets.
Notes
This is an accomplished view by Charles-Louis Clérisseau, which - like his drawing of the market at Pozzuoli (Adam vol.57/35) - is on four sheets of paper joined together. The inscription Naples may refer to the city itself rather than the antiquities at Baia or Pozzuoli; this is the only surviving drawing that is labelled Naples as opposed to Voyage di Napoli. However, no such scene or ruin in this form was found in Naples in the mid-eighteenth century, whereas it did exist at the amphitheatre at Pozzuoli, as depicted by Natali in Paoli, Avanzi Delle Antichita Esistenti a Pozzuoli Cuma e Baja, Naples, 1768, pl. XXI. The view shown in Abbé de Saint-Non, Voyage Pittoresque en Sicile et Naples, Paris, 1781-6, vol.II, pl.105 opp. p.179, is possibly closer to the spirit of this drawing by Clérisseau. In his account of Herculaneum, Robert Adam refers to traversing '... an amphitheatre with the light of torches ...' (J. Fleming, Robert Adam and his Circle in Edinburgh & Rome, London, 1962, p.155). It is possible that Adam vol.57/8 and 57/9 also show part of the interior passageway structure.
Level
Drawing
Exhibition history
The Adam Brothers in Rome: Drawings from the Grand Tour, Sir John Soane's Museum, London, 25 September 2008 - 14 February 2009
Digitisation of the Drawings Collection has been made possible through the generosity of the Leon Levy Foundation
If you have any further information about this object, please contact us: drawings@soane.org.uk