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

The geographer and Turner researcher Roland Courtot has identified Turin as the subject of this view.1 Turner arrived in the city from Milan in around mid-January 1829, before continuing westwards towards the Franco-Italian Alps. The palatial building dominating his view is the Villa della Regina, a seventeenth-century hilltop palace to the east of the city, surrounded by gardens with terraces, grottoes and fountains. It was formerly the residence of the House of Savoy.2 Turner’s viewpoint was from the present-day Strada Comunale Santa Margherita, looking north-east towards the villa’s front façade and sloping gardens, which face central Turin to the north-west. At the foot of the slopes to the left is the River Po, and the Alps are visible on the horizon.

This is one of thirteen works depicting Turin dispersed throughout the sketchbook, several of which were composed from the Monte dei Cappuccini: see under folio 7 recto (D21676) for a list of relevant works. Turner had previously visited Turin in 1819 during the outward leg of his first Italian tour: for further commentary and a list of relevant works, see Nicola Moorby’s entry for the Turin, Como, Lugarno, Maggiore sketchbook in the present catalogue (Tate D14166; Turner Bequest CLXXIV 11).