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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Northern Italy or Switzerland c.1828-44 > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner ?Northern Italian or Swiss Mountain Views, with a Castle and a Tower c.1828-44

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘?Northern Italian or Swiss Mountain Views, with a Castle and a Tower’ c.1828-44
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
?Northern Italian or Swiss Mountain Views, with a Castle and a Tower c.1828–44
D34620
Turner Bequest CCCXLIV 210
Pencil on white wove paper, 91 x 229 mm
Inscribed in red ink ‘210’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCCXLIV 210’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
These overlapping mountainous subjects, some drawn very loosely and at different orientations, are unidentified, but may be in the north of Italy or neighbouring Switzerland; see the Introduction to this section for further brief discussion and dating. There is a small tower on a rock at the top left, and a more substantial castle above other buildings at the top right.
There are other mountain sketches on the verso (D34621; Turner Bequest CCCXLIV 210v); the views were made on one half of a folded sheet, with D34623 (Turner Bequest CCCXLIV 211v) opposite the present sketch and D34622 (Turner Bequest CCCXLIV 211) on its recto.
Finberg noted: ‘(Nos. [Turner Bequest CCCXLIV] 174–226 were among the contents of a parcel endorsed by Mr. [John] Ruskin, – “B. 2. Forty-eight pieces of paper, some double or 4-ple. Pencil outline, same class as B. 1.”).’1

Matthew Imms
February 2016

1
Finberg 1909, II, p.1123.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘?Northern Italian or Swiss Mountain Views, with a Castle and a Tower c.1828–44 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-northern-italian-or-swiss-mountain-views-with-a-castle-and-a-r1183068, accessed 19 April 2024.