Saverio della Gatta

Anonymous sale, Paris, Sotheby’s, 24 June 2009, lot 32;

Private collection;

Anonymous sale, New York, Christie’s, 29 January 2015, lot 113;

Subsequently acquired by the present owner.

A. Weston-Lewis, Giovanni Battista Lusieri and the Panoramic Landscape, exh. cat., Edinburgh 2012, p. 89, under no. 16, reproduced fig. 65 (onlyThe Port of Portici).

These two views are both taken from Portici in the outskirts of Naples, but one is towards the east and shows Mount Vesuvius erupting in the background, and the other is towards the west and shows Naples in the distance. The first view, is taken from the Fortino del Granatello and shows at the left beyond a little cemetery the Palazzo Reale built in 1738 for King Charles Ill of Bourbon. The gates leading to the palace and the Villa Sarlo adjacent to it are no longer extant. The second view is taken from the Palazzo Reale and more precisely from the Villa Sarlo, shows on the left the small Fortino del Granatello (built in in 1739 by the Spanish architect Lopez Barrios to defend the Palazzo Reale, it is no longer extant), and on the right, King Fedinand IV's Porto Nuovo and part of Prince d'Elboeuf's villa (by the date of this work the property of the king, where the royal nursery was located). The watercolor encompasses the entire shoreline of the Bay of Naples, including the palace of Capodimonte, the old city, Castel Sant' Elmo and Castel dell'Ovo. In the background on the left are Capo Miseno and the island of Ischia.

Both views are based on works by Giovanni Battista Lusieri (1754–1821), The bay of Naples from Portici of 1783 formerly in the Elgin collection (Weston-Lewis, op. cit., no. 16), and The Palazzo Reale of Portici of 1784 in an Italian private collection (op. cit., fig. 10; F. Spirito, Lusieri, Naples, 2003, no. 18). Della Gatta's works are however taken from slightly different viewpoint and differ in many details. For example, while a young couple with a dog is represented in the foreground in both views of the Palazzo Reale, Lusieri chose to represent aristocratic figures, della Gatta peasants in traditional costume. Della Gatta also accentuates the effects of perspective and depth, giving more importance to the landscape.

For Lusieri's watercolour Mount Vesuvius erupting by moonlight, see lot 89.