<< YCBA Home Yale Center for British Art Yale Center for British Art << YCBA Home

YCBA Collections Search

 
IIIF Actions
Creator:
Thomas Jones, 1742–1803
Title:
The Claudian Aqueduct and Colosseum
Date:
1778
Materials & Techniques:
Watercolor and graphite with gum on medium, moderately textured, cream wove paper
Dimensions:
Sheet: 10 3/4 × 16 1/4 inches (27.3 × 41.3 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:

Inscribed in graphite, upper left: "2"; in graphite, upper center: "part of the Antique Aquaduct that convey'd water to M. Palatine- | May 1778"; in graphite, center right: "2 the Collosseo-"; in graphite, lower right: "vinyard"

Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1981.25.2637
Classification:
Drawings & Watercolors
Collection:
Prints and Drawings
Subject Terms:
amphitheater | aqueduct | arches | architectural subject | Grand Tour | landscape | ruins | trees
Associated Places:
Aqua Claudia | Colosseum | Italy | Lazio | Roma | Rome
Access:
Accessible by appointment in the Study Room [Request]
Note: The Study Room is open by appointment. Please visit the Study Room page on our website for more details.
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:10753
Export:
XML
IIIF Manifest:
JSON

Like the oil sketches on which his modern reputation largely rests, Jones's watercolors were meant not for sale or public display but for his personal amusement and reference. In his memoirs Jones recorded "making some Drawings in the garden belonging to the English colledge upon Mount Palatine" on 21 May 1778 (Jones, Memoirs, p. 72). This watercolor, together with another of a similar view in a private collection (Sumner and Smith, 2003, no. 89), were presumably the drawings made that day. At least Jones would have done the graphite underdrawing on the Palatine. The actual working up of his drawings in watercolor, quite highly finished for sketches done outdoors, may have taken place later. Despite the popular modern conception of Jones as a plein-air artist, derived from his oil sketches, it seems likely that the drawings were not finished on the spot. As Greg Smith has suggested, Jones's standard practice was probably to draw on site with graphite and add watercolor later (Sumner and Smith, 2003, pp. 185.-.99). Although the watercolors may lack the plein-air immediacy of the oil sketches.-.and we may question whether some of the oil sketches may also be less spontaneous creations than they appear.-.they, nonetheless, have an undeniable sensitivity and delicate beauty.

Scott Wilcox

Baskett, John, Jules David Prown, Duncan Robinson, Brian Allen, and William Reese. Paul Mellon's Legacy: A Passion for British Art. New Haven : Yale Center for British Art , 2007, cat. no. 48


Today Thomas Jones is best remembered for his memoirs and oil sketches. The memoirs, based in part on diaries kept during his stay in Italy between 1776 and 1783 but published only in 1951, provide an invaluable insider's view of the life of British artists in Italy in the period. His remarkably modern looking oil sketches, virtually unknown until a group of them came on the Markey in 1954, are now seen as a significant early achievement in the history of plein-air sketching in oils. While Jones's Italian Watercolors have neither the appeal to modernists sensibilities nor the claim on the art-historical imagination of the oil sketches, they have their own delicate beauty. In his memoirs Jones recorded "making some Drawings in the garden belonging to the English college upon Mount Palantine" on May 21 1778. Presumably this watercolor was done at that time, though it seems quite highly finished for a sketch made on the spot. Despite their finish Jones's watercolors of this type seem not to have been intended either for sale or exhibition, and the annotation prominently placed on the drawings suggest that they were made for personal reference.

Scott Wilcox

Wilcox, Forrester, O'Neil, Sloan. The Line of Beauty: British Drawings and Watercolors of the Eighteenth Century. Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 2001. pg. 122 cat. no. 101

An American's Passion for British Art - Paul Mellon's Legacy (Royal Academy of Arts, 2007-10-20 - 2008-01-27) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Paul Mellon's Legacy : A Passion for British Art (Yale Center for British Art, 2007-04-18 - 2007-07-29) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

An American's Passion for British Art - Paul Mellon's Legacy (Yale Center for British Art, 2007-04-18 - 2007-07-29) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Thomas Jones (1742-1803) (Whitworth Art Gallery, 2003-08-22 - 2003-10-26) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Thomas Jones (1742-1803) (National Museum Wales, 2003-05-21 - 2003-08-10) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

The Line of Beauty : British Drawings and Watercolors of the Eighteenth Century (Yale Center for British Art, 2001-05-19 - 2001-08-05) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

Presences of Nature - British Landscape 1780-1830 (Yale Center for British Art, 1982-10-20 - 1983-02-27) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Classic Ground - British Artists and the Landscape of Italy, 1740-1830 (Yale Center for British Art, 1981-07-29 - 1981-09-20) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

John Baskett, Paul Mellon's Legacy: a Passion for British Art: Masterpieces from the Yale Center for British Art, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 2007, p. 263, no. 48, pl. 48, N5220 M552 P38 2007 OVERSIZE (YCBA) [YCBA]

Duncan Bull, Classic ground : British artists and the landscape of Italy, 1740-1830, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 1981, p. 51, no. 68, ND1354.4 B85 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Sir Lawrence Gowing, The originality of Thomas Jones, Thames and Hudson, New York, 1986, pp. 33, 38, pl. 31, NJ18 .J714 G68 1986 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Louis Hawes, Presences of Nature : British Landscape, 1780-1830, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1982, pp. 92, 148, no. III.14, pl. 73, ND1354.4 H38 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Marble Hill House, Thomas Jones (1742-1803) : First exhibition of the artist's recently discovered oil sketches of Wales, Rome and Naples [at] Marble Hill House, 1 June-16 August [and] National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, 24 August-30 September, Greater London Council, London, 1970, p. 21, no. 38, NJ18 .J714 M37 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Paul Mellon's Legacy : a passion for British art [large print labels], , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 2007, v. 2, no. 48, N5220 M552 P381 2007 OVERSIZE (YCBA) [YCBA]

Greg Smith, Thomas Jones (1742-1803) : an artist rediscovered, , Yale University Press, New Haven, CT, 2003, p. 197, no. 90, pl. no. 90, NJ18 J714 T56 2003 OVERSIZE (YCBA) [YCBA]

Sotheby's sale catalogue : Fine eighteenth and nineteenth century English drawings and watercolours : 27 November 1975, Sotheby's, November 27, 1975, p. 24, lot 90, pl. XXII, Auction Catalogues (YCBA)

Scott Wilcox, Line of beauty : British drawings and watercolors of the eighteenth century, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 2001, p. 122, no. 101, NC228 W53 2001 (YCBA) [YCBA]


If you have information about this object that may be of assistance please contact us.