Thomas Jones, 'A Wall in Naples', about 1782

A Wall in Naples

Thomas Jones

Room 39

About the work

Overview

A Wall in Naples is not much larger than a postcard. The shuttered windows, irregular pattern of scaffolding holes, patchy cement and water stain from chamber pots thrown out of the window are the freshly observed details of a particular wall, although Jones may have adjusted these slightly to enhance his composition. The sketch is painted from a close viewpoint, probably across the narrow street from Thomas Jones’s roof terrace. The rectangle of sky is intensely blue suggesting that it was a very hot day in mid-summer, probably in August 1782.

The small oil sketches on paper painted in Naples during 1782 have become the best known of all the work that Jones painted during his seven-year stay in Italy. A Wall in Naples is one of five studies of buildings from high viewpoints, which are considered the most original work of his career.

In-depth

Thomas Jones’s twelve or so small oil sketches on paper painted in Naples during 1782 have become the best known of all the work that he produced during his seven-year stay in Italy. A Wall in Naples is one of five studies of buildings from high viewpoints, which are considered to be the most remarkable and original work of his career.

Most of Jones’s time in Italy was spent either in the studio, painting commissioned views in oil on canvases of conventional size, or gathering material in sketchbooks, to be worked up, sometimes years later, in watercolour. Few of his works on paper were highly finished and they were not, unlike his larger canvas paintings, the types of idealised ‘views of Italy’ bought by Grand Tourists to be taken back to England.

By the spring of 1782, Jones knew he was facing his last year in Italy. In 1779, he had set up house with Maria Moncke in Naples, where she bore him two daughters, and although they lived frugally, money was running out. Looking out from various windows or flat roofs, catching oblique views of warehouses, tenements and churches, Jones seems suddenly to have sensed the individuality of the buildings of Naples, and was determined to record it. When Jones and his family moved to the Vicolo del Canale, on the hill going up to Capodimonte, he enjoyed exclusive use of the roof terrace, and it was probably here that he painted A Wall in Naples.

Most of Jones’s Naples oils on paper are dated 1782 on the back, some are inscribed with the month as well as the year and a few have titles. A Wall in Naples has neither so it is difficult to place it in the sequence. All the rooftop views are of different sizes and it is possible that Jones cropped some to intensify their impact. A Wall in Naples is the smallest of them, not much larger than a postcard. The shuttered windows, the irregular pattern of scaffolding holes, the patchy cement and the habitual water stain from chamber pots thrown out of the window are not features that can help us to identify the building, but they are the freshly observed details of a particular wall, although Jones may have adjusted some of them to enhance his composition. The sketch is painted from a close viewpoint, probably across the narrow street from Jones’s roof terrace. The rectangle of sky is intensely blue suggesting that it was a very hot day in mid-summer, perhaps the same time as Jones painted Houses in Naples (British Museum, London), which is inscribed August 1782.

Most of Jones’s time was taken up with painting commissioned pictures, many of them large classicising landscape views. There is a huge difference between Jones’s ’studies‘ and his ’Pictures'. For example, Lake Albano (Yale Center for British Art, New Haven USA) is almost six-foot wide and took 41 days to paint. Working in oil on paper on a small scale and directly recording what he alone viewed as a subject, Jones achieves an originality not hinted at in his larger canvases.

Want to find out more?

Delve deeper and explore the catalogue entry for this painting.

Key facts

Details

Full title: A Wall in Naples
Artist: Thomas Jones
Artist dates: 1742 - 1803
Date made: about 1782
Medium and support: oil on paper, mounted on canvas
Dimensions: 11.4 × 16 cm
Acquisition credit: Bought, 1993
Inventory number: NG6544
Location: Room 39
Collection: Main Collection
Frame: 20th-century Replica Frame

Provenance

After the artist’s death, passed to his younger daughter Elizabeth Francesca who, having married Captain John Dale, died in 1806 leaving no surviving children; passed to Captain Dale, then by descent through Rose Adams (his daughter by his second marriage) to his great-grandson Dr Adams, by whose widow sold Christie’s 28 July 1955 (as ‘An Italian house’, one of three in lot 6, £14), bt Agnew’s; purchased from Agnew’s by Lady Ashton (Madge Garland, Royal College of Art, Department of Fashion and Design) December 1955; sold by her, Christie’s 23 March 1979 (88, £5500), bt Appleby Brothers for Mrs Jane Evan-Thomas, widow of Commander Charles Evan-Thomas DSO, RN, of Pencerrig; purchased from Mrs Evan-Thomas through Agnew’s by the National Gallery 1993.

Additional information

Text extracted from the ‘Provenance’ section of the catalogue entry in Judy Egerton, ‘National Gallery Catalogues: The British Paintings’, London 2000; for further information, see the full catalogue entry.

Exhibition history

2009

Corot to Monet: A Fresh Look at Landscape from the Collection

The National Gallery (London)

8 July 2009 - 20 September 2009
2013

Through European Eyes: The Landscape Oil Sketch

The National Gallery (London)

6 February 2013 - 28 April 2013
2014

Artistic Exchanges: Corot, Costa, Leighton

The National Gallery (London)

7 May 2014 - 3 September 2014
2018

Tacita Dean: STILL LIFE

The National Gallery (London)

15 March 2018 - 28 May 2018
2024

Napoli Ottocento

Scuderie del Quirinale

27 March 2024 - 16 June 2024

Bibliography

1959

J.A. Gere, 'An Oil-Sketch by Thomas Jones', British Museum Quarterly, XXI/4, 1959, pp. 93-4
1968

Romantic Art in Britain: Paintings and Drawings 1760-1860, Detroit 1968
1970

R.C.B. Oliver, The Family History of Thomas Jones the Artist of Pencerrig, Radnorshire, Llandysul 1970
1970

J.A. Gere, 'Thomas Jones: An Eighteenth-Century Conundrum', Apollo, XCI, 1970
1973

A. Blunt, 'Recorders of Vanished Naples, I', Country Life, 1973
1981

R. Causa, 'A British Painter in Naples of Ferdinand Iv', Campania, 1981
1981

D. Bull, Classic Ground: British Artists and the Landscape of Italy, 1740-1830 (exh. cat. Yale Center for British Art, 29 July - 20 September 1981), New Haven 1981
1981

P. Galassi, Before Photography: Painting and the Invention of Photography (exh. cat. Museum of Modern Art, 9 May - 5 July 1981), New York 1981
1984

P. Morgan, 'Thomas Jones of Pencerrig', Transactions of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion, 1984, pp. 51-76
1985

L. Gowing, The Originality of Thomas Jones, London 1985
1986

J. Egerton, 'Book Review of Lawrence Gowing "The Originality of Thomas Jones"', The Burlington Magazine, CXXVIII/1000, 1986
1987

R. Wollheim, Painting as an Art, London 1987
1988

F.W. Hawcroft, Travels in Italy 1776-1783: Based on the Memoirs of Thomas Jones (exh. cat. Whitworth Art Gallery, 7 October - 10 December 1988), Manchester 1988
1991

P. Galassi, Corot in Italy: Open-Air Painting and the Classical-landscape Tradition, New Haven 1991
1993

G. Belli, Romanticismo: Il nuovo sentimento della natura (exh. cat. Museo d'arte moderna e contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto and Palazzo delle Albere, 15 May - 29 August 1993), Milan 1993
1994

National Gallery, The National Gallery Report: April 1993- March 1994, London 1994
1994

A.O. Cavina, I paesaggi della ragione: La città neoclassica da David a Humbert de Superville, Turin 1994
1996

P. Conisbee et al., In the Light of Italy: Corot and early Open-Air Painting (exh. cat. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 26 May - 2 September 1996; Brooklyn Museum, 11 October 1996 - 12 January 1997; Saint Louise Art Musuem, 21 February - 18 May 1997), New Haven 1996
1998

J. Egerton, The British School, London 1998
1998

J. Egerton, 'Author's Picture Choice', National Gallery News, 1988
2000

Egerton, Judy, National Gallery Catalogues: The British Paintings, revised edn, London 2000
2001

C. Baker and T. Henry, The National Gallery: Complete Illustrated Catalogue, London 2001
2004

P. Conisbee, S. Faunce and Y. Kohari, Plein-air painting in Europe 1780-1850 (exh. cat. Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Shizuoka; Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne), Shizuoka 2004

Frame

Made in England in 1994, this is a replica frame in the style of an eighteenth-century Italian bolection profile. At the inside edge of the gilded frame is a cloth-covered slip frame, which has been painted.

About this record

If you know more about this painting or have spotted an error, please contact us. Please note that exhibition histories are listed from 2009 onwards. Bibliographies may not be complete; more comprehensive information is available in the National Gallery Library.