# View of Vesuvius from Posilippo [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [WRIGHT, Joseph]() - Date: 1751-1800 - Technique: Oil on canvas ## Commentary Wright of Derby's views of extravagant and violent explosions \(numbering thirty in all\), with white lava shooting skywards, may never have been witnessed firsthand by the artist, who, in his few months spent in Naples, never saw anything more dramatic than lava pouring at snail's pace down the mountain slopes. His pictures of raging flames and molten rocks almost certainly <a onclick="return OpenOther\('/html/v/volaire/eruption.html'\)" href="/html/v/volaire/eruption.html">borrowed directly from Volaire,</a> who had been an eye witness to all Vesuvius's major eruptions since his arrival in Naples. ## Related artworks - [A Grotto in the Gulf of Salerno]() - [A Philosopher Lecturing with a Mechanical Planetary]() - [Academy by Lamplight \(detail\)]() - [Academy by Lamplight]() - [An Academy by Lamplight]() - [Earthstopper at the Bank of Derwent]() - [Experiment with the Air Pump]() - [Indian Widow]() - [Iron Forge Viewed from Outside]() - [Landscape with Rainbow]() - [Miravan Opening the Grave of his Forefathers]() - [Portrait of Jane Darwin and Her Son William Brown Darwin]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()