Friedrich Nerly
(Erfurt 1807 - 1878 Venice)
The Grotto at Posillipo, near Naples
Oil on canvas
127.2 x 96 cm
On the verso a label numbered 263 and inscribed Nerly, Innere Ansicht der Grotte des Pausi- / lipp bei Neapel. / br: [evi] m: [anu] durch Herrn Geh. Kämmerier Schöning[1], / als von S. Majestät d. Könige erkauft, erhal- / ten d. 11[.] 12 /[18]47. / Illaire[2]
Provenance:
Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia, purchased in 1847
Prince Karl of Prussia (Kunstsachen-Journal no. 263, 16.12.1847)
In the evening we went to the Grotta di Posillipo and reached it just at the moment when the rays of the setting sun were shining directly into the entrance. Now I can forgive anyone for going off his head about Naples ....[3] Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 27 February 1787 (trans: W. H. Auden).
The grotto at Posillipo - also known as the Crypta Napolitana - runs through part of Monte Posillipo. It is actually a narrow, 711-metre tunnel cut from the rock in the reign of Augustus to create a new coastal road to shorten the route between Naples and the Campi Flegrei.[4]
Nerly regularly travelled to southern Italy when he was living in Rome in the years 1831-5 and on one of his tours to Naples visited the famous grotto. It was a sight no cultured tourist could miss. This has made it a motif with an important pictorial tradition.[5] Nerly almost certainly executed his painting of the subject after he had left Rome. He completed it very probably in Venice some time after 1837, basing it on studies he had made sur le motif - as Mechthild Lucke posits. Given the large format of the work, this date seems plausible.
Nerly's virtuosity in the handling of the compositional structure of the scene and his rendering of the effects of light in the tunnel are remarkable. The painting closely recalls his impressive Venetian night pieces. The figures shown towards the end of the tunnel are depicted in silhouette as in papercuts, and set against the glare of daylight at the mouth of the tunnel. In the foreground a warm glow radiates from several large lanterns suspended from the roof. Candlelight streams from a small rock-hewn chapel in the tunnel wall and illuminates groups of people, city dwellers and country folk, mounted and on foot[6] - a shepherd with his flock, a hay wain, a small group waiting at the chapel doors.
The painting was once in the possession of the Prussian Royal Family. It was listed as no. 263 (duplicating no. 245) in the Kunstsachen-Journal [register of art objects] of Friedrich Wilhelm IV under the title Innere Ansicht der Grotte des Pausilipp [Interior of the Grotto at Posillipo]. Illaire noted (see label on the verso): Ist Eigenthum Sr. K. Hoheit des Prinzen Karl u. dem Hn. Hofrath Wagener zugesandt ['Property of HRH Prince Karl and sent to Privy Councillor Wagener']. Nerly knew both the Prussian Crown Prince and Wilhelm IV personally. The Prussian Royal Family often consulted him on questions of acquisition.[7] The painting was probably acquired by or on behalf of Friedrich Wilhelm IV when he visited Northern Italy and Venice in September 1847.[8] The archives fail to clarify whether it was purchased for Prince Karl of Prussia or given to him.
We are grateful to Wolfram Morath-Vogel and Mechthild Lucke in Erfurt and to Gerd Bartoschek in Berlin for their research findings.
[1] See Handbuch über den königlich preußischen Hof und Staat für das Jahr 1844, p.19. Schöning is identified as Königlicher Geheimer Kämmerier, Hr. Schöning, auch Rendant der Königlichen Chatoulle ['Royal Privy Chamberlain Schöning, furthermore Treasurer of the Royal Purse'].
[2] Heinrich Theodor Illaire (1788-1850), Prussian Secretary of State to the Royal Household, Privy Councillor in the Lord Chamberlain's Office, see Handbuch über den königlich preußischen Hof und Staat für das Jahr 1844, p.19.
[3] Wir sind auch noch abends in die Grotte des Posillipo gegangen, da eben die untergehende Sonne zur andern Seite herein schien. Ich verzieh es allen, die in Neapel von Sinnen kommen, J. W. von Goethe, Italienische Reise, Neapel, den 27. Februar: Grotte des Posilippo. Nerly met Goethe at his house in Weimar in 1827 and presented him with a portfolio of drawings. See Julia M. Nauhaus, 'Vom Kuhhirten zum kleinen Grafen. Friedrich Nerlys Begegnungen mit Künstlern und herausragenden Persönlichkeiten in Hamburg, Rom und Venedig', in Wolfram Morath-Vogel (ed.), Friedrich Nerly zum 200. Geburtstag. Römische Tage - Venezianische Nächte, exhib. cat., Dessau, Anhaltische Gemäldegalerie; Lübeck, Museum Behnhaus / Drägerhaus; Paderborn, Städtische Galerie in der Reithalle, Erfurt 2007, p.13.
[4] See Im Land der Sehnsucht. Mit Bleistift und Kamera durch Italien. 1820 bis 1880, exhib. cat., Kunsthalle Bremen and elsewhere, 1998, p.234 f.
[5] - Louis-Jean Desprez and Francesco Piranesi, Grotte de Posilippe de nuit a Naples, 1791, line etching, watercolour and bodycolour, 77.5 x 51 cm, British Museum, London.
- Hubert Robert, La Grotte du Pausilippe à Naples, 1760-1, oil on canvas, 38.7 x 33.3 cm, Musée du Petit Palais, Paris.
[6] See Margit Schermuck-Ziesché, 'Ländliche Idylle und urbanes Treiben. Nerlys Figurenstudien und Bildstaffage', in Friedrich Nerly zum 200. Geburtstag, op. cit., p.61.
[7] See Franz Meyer, 'Friedrich von Nerly, Eine biographisch-kunsthistorische Studie', in Mitteilungen des Vereins für die Geschichte und Altertumskunde von Erfurt, XXVIII, 1907, p.70f.
[8] Preamble to diary entries of 24 November and 16 December 1847: Sr. M. durch d. Hn. Geh. Kämmerer Schöning ['His Maj. via Privy Chamberlain Schöning'].