From the exhibition Thomas Cole in Italy and Switzerland, 1841-1842
August 16, 2002-January 29, 2003
This is a preliminary drawing for one of Cole’s most celebrated paintings, The View of Etna from Taormina of 1843. Cole painted at least six views of Mount Etna, a volcanic mountain in eastern Sicily. He climbed the peak and described the hike in his journal on May 9, 1842. He also wrote a poem called “Mount Etna,” from which an excerpt follows:
Sublime art thou O Mount!…
[W]hen thy scathed sides
Are laved with fire; answered thine earthquake voice
By screams and clamor of affrighted men.
Lone mountain of the pallid brow and heart
Of fire! Thou art a resting place for thought,
Thought reaching far above thy bounds; from thee
To Him who bade the central fires construct
This wond’rous fabric.
