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 > Turin, Como, Lugarno, Maggiore ... > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner View of Avigliana, with the Castle and Church of Santa Maria Maggiore 1819

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘View of Avigliana, with the Castle and Church of Santa Maria Maggiore’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 10 Recto:
View of Avigliana, with the Castle and Church of Santa Maria Maggiore 1819
D14162
Turner Bequest CLXXIV 9
Pencil on white wove paper, 111 x 186 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘284’ top right and ‘9’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXIV 9’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
As Federico Crimi first identified,1 the subject of this sketch is Avigliana, a town approximately twenty-two miles east of the French-Italian border, which lies on the main road through the Val di Susa, between Susa and Turin. The most notable landmark in the drawing is the castello, or castle, dating from the sixth century but destroyed by the French during the seventeenth century. Turner has drawn the view from the historic old town with the castle visible on the heights above to the right. The Romanesque church visible on the left is Santa Maria Maggiore which is situated near the north-west edge of the town.
Further studies of the castle from the town can be found on folio 10 verso (D14163; Turner Bequest CLXXIV 9a).

Nicola Moorby
December 2012

1
Crimi 2007, p.22 note 15.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘View of Avigliana, with the Castle and Church of Santa Maria Maggiore 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, December 2012, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, August 2013, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-view-of-avigliana-with-the-castle-and-church-of-santa-maria-r1142685, accessed 21 December 2024.