View from the Colosseum toward the Palatine

German Painter

Date unknown · Oil on paper, laid down on cardboard · European Paintings

This is a view from a desiccated upper gallery of the Colosseum, looking across its open bowl toward the remains of the amphitheater’s even more porous southwest wall. The Palatine Hill and its ruins are in the distance. The balance of detail—near, far, and in between—makes this sketch legible as a picture although perhaps not immediately recognizable as a portrait of the most famous monument in Rome. This work was long thought to be by the German painter Ernst Fries (1801–1833); it may well have been painted about 1825, when he was in Rome.

Artist

German Painter

Date

Date unknown

Medium

Oil on paper, laid down on cardboard

Department

European Paintings

Credit line

The Whitney Collection, Promised Gift of Wheelock Whitney III, and Purchase, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Charles S. McVeigh, by exchange, 2003