Comments on: Labeling Turner

By: Matthew Perdue

Matthew Perdue — Sun, 17 Jul 2011 19:21:27 +0000

Dearest Emily: I learned much reading your write up of labeling Turner’s “Modern Rome—Campo Vaccino” and thank you greatly. As my friends that go with me to museums have said, I seem to read every word of every label on every piece of art work in the museum. With my next visit to the Getty I will savor reading again the written art you have produced next to the visual art it enlightens. Bravo!Monte bene! Grazzi!

By: Annelisa Stephan

Annelisa Stephan — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 16:29:00 +0000

Hi Mara — Thanks for your design question. I just checked with Irma, and the font is Minion Pro, which is what we use for all our permanent collection labels. It’s a classic, highly legible serif font. -Annelisa, Iris editor

By: Mara

Mara — Sat, 28 May 2011 18:33:42 +0000

What font did they use for the wall label?

By: Steve Saldivar

Steve Saldivar — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 22:59:13 +0000

Hi Marilyn,

Great question! Glass is placed on artworks that are deemed vulnerable to damage by touch. Pictures that seem tempting for people to point at or paintings that attract a closer-than-average inspection by visitors will often be placed under glass. Turner’s “Modern Rome” is no different. In addition, this particular work has been in an extraordinary state of preservation and has been under glass since 1878. Glass will help to keep it that way.

Steve, Social Media Coordinator

By: Marilyn Adams

Marilyn Adams — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 18:37:30 +0000

I have long been enthralled with Turner’s extravagant use of color and light to immerse the viewer into the heart of his paintings and am already planning my pilgrimage to see the Getty’s latest inspired acquisition. But I have a long-standing question to ask: Why are some oil paintings covered by glass and others (by the same artist/same period) not?

By: Allen J. Manzano

Allen J. Manzano — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 05:28:34 +0000

I am sure that “nacreous” is an exotic word in the sense that most of us will have to look it up. It took a minute for me to realize it was based on a word I have known since childhood. In Spanish “nacre” is “mother of pearl” and we see it here in California as the inner layer of an abalone shell as it plays with the light in dazzles of colors. The use of the word is absolutely perfect in context. Once used it becomes definitive for what Turner does again and again in his fantasies. I think it is an inspired and powerfully accurate word and if you were to put a nacreous sea shell next to the painting on a small plinth, people would rejoice at how art and nature evoke one another. Bravo!

By: Tyson Gaskill

Tyson Gaskill — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 21:18:06 +0000

Label writing is indeed an art in and of itself. I worked on them for many years at the GRI and had many vigorous debates with the curators about the language we used. Do you expect most people comprehend the word “nacreous”? I’m an art history major but I would be willing to bet most lay people are unfamiliar with it.

By: Marcia

Marcia — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 21:04:39 +0000

Is the painting going to remain on view over the summer?

By: Annelisa Stephan

Annelisa Stephan — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 22:20:54 +0000

Hi David — Thanks for your comment! The final text of the label is right below the last image in the post. –Annelisa/editor

By: David

David — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 21:47:51 +0000

I will go to see this painting as soon as I can… meanwhile, could you please post your Turner label, I can’t read it in the photo. I’m anxious to see what it says!

It’s hard to imagine that any painter (even a genius) could paint a view like this from memory ten years after. One would need, at the very least, a map and sketches to make the monuments recognizable and correctly placed. Depicting a goat from memory is difficult enough!