A View of the Colosseum, Rome - Rafael Valls

1846

Medium

Oil on Canvas

Status

In Gallery Collection

Collect24 Art ID

C24-150527

A group of tourists are led by a procession of monks towards the Colosseum with the Arch of Constantine to the right. More tourists can be spied walking between the arcades of the structure and carriages arrive and depart to carry their charges. This bright, sunny scene was almost certainly painted for a Grand Tourist much like those presented here and follows in the tradition of vedute scenes of the previous century. After the Napoleonic Wars tourism around Europe only became easier over the course of the 19th century. Whereas before it was typically only gentlemen of considerable wealth, classical students and artists who would risk travelling to Rome, by the 1840s families could come all the way from England in relative comfort and enjoy themselves in safety and luxury.