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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Osimo 1819

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 5 Recto:
Osimo 1819
D14661
Turner Bequest CLXXVII 5
Pencil on white wove paper, 110 x 186 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Ossimio’ bottom right
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘5’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXVII 5’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
After a sustained period of travel along the east coast from Rimini, Turner’s route towards Rome turned inland at Ancona and began to follow a south-westerly course towards the Apennine Mountains. Many of the urban settlements in this part of Italy were built upon high ground and Turner made a number of sketches of the hilltop towns and cities he glimpsed as he travelled through the landscape of the Marche region of Italy. The order of these drawings within the beginning of this sketchbook does not appear to follow a strict geographical sequence.
This sketch is identifiable from the inscribed place name as a distant view of Osimo, a hill town approximately nine miles south of Ancona. In the foreground on the left are some partial sketches of a woman carrying a basket on her head, as seen from the front and the back. This is possibly the same figure who appears on the preceding page, see folio 4 verso (D14660).

Nicola Moorby
November 2008

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Osimo 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, November 2008, 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-osimo-r1138823, accessed 28 March 2024.