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Artist or Maker: Joseph Wright of Derby, R.A. (1734-1797)

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Provenance: The Bastard family, Kiteley Court, Devon.
Sotheby's, London, 12 March 1986, lot 86 (sold £28,600).

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Literature: Possibly B. Nicholson, Joseph Wright of Derby, I, p.257.

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Notes: Wright of Derby left England for Italy together with his pregnant wife Hannah, his pupil Richard Hurleston, John Downman and the sculptor James Paine in 1773. Travelling by boat, he arrived in Nice by December, sailing on to Genoa and then to Leghorn, from which he travelled overland to Rome, eventually arriving on 3 February 1774. During the autumn he visited Naples, Vesuvius, Pompeii and Herculaneum, making several expeditions to the various grottoes in the Gulf of Salerno where he sketched chalk drawings on the spot showing the view out to sea from the grotto interiors. Before the end of the year, he had worked these up into two large paintings showing the light effects at different times of day; one by morning light, and the other by evening light (see Benedict Nicolson, op.cit, II, plates 174 & 175).

No doubt inspired by the dramatic and painterly potential of the grottoes, Wright continued to paint versions of the scene, and two further works of 'Grottos by the sea side in the Gulf of Salerno' were sold to 'Mr Hodges' (possibly the artist William Hodges, a previous pupil of Wright's) in the later 1770s for £105. At the time of the present work's sale at Sotheby's in 1987 David Fraser suggested that it could well be one of these views sold to Hodges and previously thought to be missing.

In 1780, Wright continued to make use of the grotto in yet another pair of works that incorporated figures, one with banditti and the other with the figure of Julia, exhibited at the Royal Academy that year.

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