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

The geographer and Turner researcher Roland Courtot has identified this view as Camogli, a Ligurian fishing village to the west of the Portofino promontory.1 The Basilica of Santa Maria Assunta appears at the centre of the page, while the belltower located further inland on the slopes to the left is possibly the Santuario di Nostra Signora del Boschetto. The topography of the Riviera di Levante, the stretch of Ligurian coastline linking Genoa and La Spezia, is also swiftly outlined. As Courtot noted, the artist’s viewpoint appears to be from the route to Rapallo near Ruta, looking north-west towards distant Genoa.2 This is a more schematic version of the view on folio 42 recto opposite (D21494).