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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > First Italian Tour 1819-20 > Milan to Venice Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Porta Ticinese, Milan, with the Ponte del Trofeo, Campanile of Sant'Eustorgio, Spire of the Cathedral and Cupola of San Lorenzo 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Porta Ticinese, Milan, with the Ponte del Trofeo, Campanile of Sant'Eustorgio, Spire of the Cathedral and Cupola of San Lorenzo’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 9 Recto:
The Porta Ticinese, Milan, with the Ponte del Trofeo, Campanile of Sant’Eustorgio, Spire of the Cathedral and Cupola of San Lorenzo 1819
D14340
Turner Bequest CLXXV 9
Pencil on white wove paper, 112 x 185 mm
Partial watermark ‘Al | 18’
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘9’ top right and ‘300’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXV 9’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
As Federico Crimi and Ian Warrell have recognised, the subject is the Porta Ticinese, which stands on the south-western side of central Milan, facing the modern Piazza Ventiquattro Maggio. The free-standing neoclassical Ionic structure is shown from the west along what is now the Viale Gorizia, with the Ponte del Trofeo1 in the foreground at the point where the Naviglio Pavese canal runs into the city’s dock, the Darsena. The pedimented monument which gave the bridge its name was taken down in the 1870s and is now in the Castello Sforzesco Museum.2 In the distance on the left is the campanile of the church of Sant’Eustorgio.3
The skyline is continued north-east towards central Milan a little way across on folio 8 verso opposite (D14339). The Porta Ticinese is seen from the other direction on folio 8 recto (D14338). See under folio 2 recto (D14328) for other Milan views.

Matthew Imms
March 2017

1
See Crimi 2007, p.39 note 56, and undated notes by Warrell in Tate catalogue files.
2
See ‘La Darsana’, Vecchia Milano, accessed 3 February 2017, https://vecchiamilano.wordpress.com/2010/05/07/la-darsena/.
3
See Crimi 2007, p.39 note 56, and undated notes by Warrell in Tate catalogue files.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The Porta Ticinese, Milan, with the Ponte del Trofeo, Campanile of Sant’Eustorgio, Spire of the Cathedral and Cupola of San Lorenzo 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2017, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, July 2017, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-porta-ticinese-milan-with-the-ponte-del-trofeo-campanile-r1186453, accessed 17 May 2024.