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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Italy c.1828-43 > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Ruined ?Italian Fortifications on a Rock c.1828-43

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Ruined ?Italian Fortifications on a Rock’ c.1828-43
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Ruined ?Italian Fortifications on a Rock c.1828–43
D40332
Turner Bequest CCCXLI 243v
Pencil on buff wove paper, 151 x 225 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘444’ bottom left and in pencil 145 | O’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This riverside subject is unidentified, but may be Italian; see the Introduction to this section for further brief discussion and dating. Finberg’s 1909 Inventory entry for this sheet gives the recto title as ‘Ruined fortifications on rock’ with the ‘Reverse’ as ‘View of city, with towers, &c.’.1 It appears that he intended the first title to describe the present view, although the other side (D33957; Turner Bequest CCCXLI 243), showing a more coherent urban skyline, was subsequently stamped with the Turner Bequest number usually reserved for the recto.

Matthew Imms
February 2016

1
Finberg 1909, II, p.1076.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Ruined ?Italian Fortifications on a Rock c.1828–43 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-ruined-italian-fortifications-on-a-rock-r1183014, accessed 25 April 2024.