A Wall in Naples

By the spring of 1782 Thomas Jones knew it would be his last year in Italy. He had a partner and two small daughters in Naples, and the money was running out. His working days went into commissioned canvases, classical landscapes for Grand Tour travellers. One of them, Lake Albano, now at Yale, is almost six feet wide and took him 41 days. This oil sketch on paper is the opposite. It is one of five studies of city buildings seen from above, made for himself alone. Most of his sketches from that year are dated on the back, some with the month. This one carries nothing, so its place in that summer is a guess. The deep blue suggests a very hot day, and the stain under the balcony, the gallery notes, comes from chamber pots emptied out of the window.