J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > First Italian Tour 1819-20 > Rome and Florence Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Three Sketches on the Road Between Rome and Florence, Including the Castle of Montecchio Vesponi; Castiglion Fiorentino; and a Distant View of Arezzo 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Three Sketches on the Road Between Rome and Florence, Including the Castle of Montecchio Vesponi; Castiglion Fiorentino; and a Distant View of Arezzo’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 1 Verso:
Three Sketches on the Road Between Rome and Florence, Including the Castle of Montecchio Vesponi; Castiglion Fiorentino; and a Distant View of Arezzo 1819
D16487
Turner Bequest CXCI 1 a
Pencil on white wove paper, 189 x 113 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Castello Fiorentino’ and ‘Castello Fiorentino’ underneath upper sketch and ‘Arezzo’ bottom right of bottom sketch
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
As Turner’s inscriptions indicate, this page contains three landscape views associated with Turner’s journey between Rome and Florence. The uppermost sketch depicts the castle of Montecchio Vesponi, a fortress tower surrounded by walled battlements which occupies the summit of a hill a couple of miles south of the nearby town of Castiglion Fiorentino, approximately five miles north-west of Cortona. Turner’s viewpoint is from the road to the south-west. The central study meanwhile shows part of Castiglion Fiorentino itself. Rising above the rest of the town is the square tower and projecting bell-tower of the fortress, or ‘Cassero’. The final vista at the bottom of the sheet depicts a distant view of Arezzo, approximately ten miles north-west of Castiglion Fiorentino.
For further views of Castiglion Fiorentino see folio 26 verso and 90 verso (D16534 and D16638) and for Arezzo see folios 29 verso (D16540).

Nicola Moorby
November 2010

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Three Sketches on the Road Between Rome and Florence, Including the Castle of Montecchio Vesponi; Castiglion Fiorentino; and a Distant View of Arezzo 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, November 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-three-sketches-on-the-road-between-rome-and-florence-r1138380, accessed 26 April 2024.