The Castel Nuovo in Naples, with a View of Mount Vesuvius
ca. 1737–53
Medium
Pen and brown ink, brush and brown and gray wash, over black chalk
Dimensions
13 1/8 x 19 7/16 in. (33.4 x 49.4 cm)
Classification
Drawings
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Harry G. Sperling Fund, 1976
Accession Number
1976.334.1
Tags
Art Historical Context
Joseph Vernet created this evocative drawing of Naples’s Castel Nuovo during his extended stay in Italy from 1734 to 1753. A leading French landscape painter of the eighteenth century, Vernet specialized in luminous marine and coastal views that appealed to Grand Tour travelers. Here he pairs the massive Angevin fortress—its towers rising above the harbor—with the ever-present silhouette of Mount Vesuvius, capturing the dramatic dialogue between human architecture and volcanic nature that fascinated visitors to southern Italy. Executed in pen and brown ink with layered washes of brown and gra...