English: Hans Edvard Nørregård-Nielsen refers to the motif in “Christen Købke Italien tur-retur", p. 182 (in Danish): "The slender, bronze-coloured young boy is the embodiment of the local population that the Golden Age painters were searching for in this part of Italy, along the coast previously inhabited by Greeks. The boy, with his red Phrygian cap, is the aged Greeks' descendant on his way to replace them in doing the day's work along the coast”.
The island Capri was “discovered” by artists and travellers in the beginning of the 1820s, at the time when Herculanum and Pompeii were being excavated. A great interest in and fascination of the region around Naples, the Amalfi coast and on Capri arose.
The Danish heir to the throne Christian Frederik (VIII) and his wife Caroline Amalie visited Capri in 1820. The painter I. C. Dahl stayed there for a longer time. The sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen and the painter Thöming went there in 1828. Petzholdt painted many landscapes from the region, and those works inspired Købke to travel to Capri with his friend Constantin Hansen. They spent several months there in 1839.
Købke's enthusiasm for Capri and its people can be seen in the many works - both studies and finished works - of the inhabitants (the young fishing boy for instance) and the landscapes. Even his membership piece for the Royal Academy of Fine Arts was a motif from Capri.