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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Second Italian Tour 1828-9 > Marseilles to Genoa Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Mouth of the River Roia at Ventimiglia 1828

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Mouth of the River Roia at Ventimiglia’ 1828
Folio 32 Recto:
The Mouth of the River Roia at Ventimiglia 1828
D21193
Turner Bequest CCXXXI 32
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 174 mm
Inscribed by the artist in red ink ‘32’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCXXXI 32’ bottom left, descending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner made several sketches at Ventimiglia on the Ligurian coast. The geographer and Turner researcher Roland Courtot has identified the subject of this drawing as the mouth of the River Roia, where it meets the Mediterranean sea at Ventimiglia.1 With the page turned horizontally, Turner’s viewpoint is standing on the shoreline on the right bank of the Roia, looking east across the river towards the emerging new town on the left bank, with the coast stretching out towards Bordighera in the distance. The masts of boats docked against the quayside can be seen in the central foreground.
For further sketches of Ventimiglia see the verso (D21194). See also the Coast of Genoa sketchbook from 1838, when Turner revisited this location (Tate D21283; Turner Bequest CCXXXII 7).
1
Roland Courtot, ‘Les Carnets de William Turner: Recherches d’identification et de localisation des dessins’, unpublished research notes, Université de Provence à Aix, April 2008, p.5, as ‘Ventimiglia’ (shared with former Tate cataloguer Nicola Moorby in email correspondence at that date).
Technical notes:
There is a small stained area in the top right-hand corner, probably the result of water damage.

Nicola Moorby
March 2017

Revised by Hannah Kaspar
November 2024

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘The Mouth of the River Roia at Ventimiglia 1828’, catalogue entry, March 2017, revised by Hannah Kaspar, November 2024, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, February 2025, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/the-mouth-of-the-river-roia-at-ventimiglia-r1209871, accessed 01 June 2026.