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 > Return from Italy Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Aiguebelle and the Roc of Charbonnière, Savoy 1820

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Aiguebelle and the Roc of Charbonnière, Savoy’ 1820
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 25 Verso:
Aiguebelle and the Roc of Charbonnière, Savoy 1820
D16689
Turner Bequest CXCII 24 a
Pencil on white wove paper, 98 x 128 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Hol de Post’, ‘Yellow’, ‘7’ and ‘3’ and ‘Grey’ within building, right-hand side of sketch, and ‘wood wagons’ bottom centre
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This sketch depicts a view of Aiguebelle,1 a town at the entrance of the Maurienne Valley in Savoy, approximately twenty miles east of Chambéry. The artist had first passed through Aiguebelle in the autumn of 1819 during his journey east towards the Mont Cenis pass, and later returned in January 1820 as part of his westward route home. He made several studies in and around the town, see also folios 24 and 24 verso (D16686 and D16687; Turner Bequest CXCII 23 and 23a).
Turner’s composition looking south-east along the town’s main road (Grand Rue) towards the Roc de Charbonnière, a hill upon which stands a ruined castle, formerly a defensive stronghold of the ruling House of Savoy. Visible in the far distance are the jagged peaks of the Lauzière massif. A faint inscription on the building flanking the right-hand side of the road indicates that this is the ‘Hotel de la Poste’, the coaching inn where it is likely that the artist may have stayed.2 A comparable view dating from the outward leg of Turner’s itinerary can be found within the Paris, France, Savoy 2 sketchbook (Tate D14119; Turner Bequest CLXXIII 77a).

Nicola Moorby
April 2013

1
Finberg suggested that the subject was either Aiguebelle or Lanslebourg. Finberg 1909, p.572.
2
This building still stands and operates as a hotel today. It can be seen in old photographs and engravings of the town. The nineteenth-century travel writer Mariana Starke described it as a ‘good inn’. Mariana Starke, Travels on the Continent written for the Use and Particular Information of Travellers, London 1820, p.671.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Aiguebelle and the Roc of Charbonnière, Savoy 1820 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, August 2013, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-aiguebelle-and-the-roc-of-charbonniere-savoy-r1142589, accessed 26 April 2024.