MENDELSSOHN'S SKETCHES

The great majority of Mendelssohn’s sketches seem to have been simple aide-memoires, just a way of quickly capturing an image that took his imagination, just as we might take a quick picture with our smartphones. (Mendelssohn never drew his food, though…) He made some of his most highly-finished and elaborate drawings on this trip, with a number of double-page spreads, especially around Naples and the Amalfi coast.