- Description
-
- Creator(s)
- Thomas Girtin (1775-1802) and (?) Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) after John Robert Cozens (1752-1797)
- Title
-
- Florence: The Convent of Monte Oliveto, from the Banks of the Arno
- Date
- 1794 - 1797
- Medium and Support
- Graphite and watercolour on laid paper
- Dimensions
- 14 × 23.2 cm, 5 ½ × 9 ⅛ in
- Object Type
- Monro School Copy
- Subject Terms
- Italian View: Tuscany; River Scenery
-
- Collection
- Versions
-
Florence: The Convent of Monte Oliveto, from the Banks of the Arno
(TG0747)
- Catalogue Number
- TG0748
- Description Source(s)
- Girtin Archive Photograph
Provenance
Squire Gallery, London, 1955
Place depicted
Other entries in Monro School Copies:
Italian Views after Drawings by John Robert Cozens Made on the Second Italian Trip, 1782–83

The Temple of Venus at Baia
Private Collection

Entering the Tyrol: Unidentified Buildings amongst Wooded Hills
Tate, London

An Unidentified Fortress: Entering the Tyrol Region
Private Collection

A View on the River Inn, in the Tyrol
Tate, London

Innsbruck: St Anna's Column on Maria-Theresien Street
Victoria and Albert Museum, London

A Tree-Lined Valley, near Innsbruck
Private Collection

A Church Tower in the Valley of the Isarco, near Sterzing, in the Tyrol
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

The Euganean Hills, Seen from the Walls of Padua
Tate, London

Part of Padua, Seen from the Walls
Private Collection

The Abbey of Santa Giustina at Padua
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

The View from Mirabello, the Villa of Count Algarotti in the Euganean Hills
Private Collection

A Convent on Monte della Madonna in the Euganean Hills
Tate, London

Fano, on the Adriatic Coast
Private Collection

Terracina: The View from the Inn, with the Temple of Jupiter Anxur
Tate, London

Naples: The Villa Belvedere, Seen from Sir William Hamilton's Villa at Posillipo
Private Collection

Naples: The View from Sir William Hamilton's Villa at Portici
Private Collection

Portici: Mounts Somma and Vesuvius, from the Myrtle Plantation at Sir William Hamilton’s Villa
Tate, London

Naples: Solimena’s Villa and Pine Trees
Private Collection

Portici: The Fortress in the Royal Park, Looking towards Mounts Somma and Vesuvius
Tate, London

Portici: The Imperial Minister's Villa, near the Harbour of Granatello
Private Collection

Portici: The View from Sir William Hamilton's Villa, with Vesuvius in the Distance
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

Portici: The Royal Palace, from the Park
Tate, London

The Coast at Portici, with the Villa d'Elboeuf in the Foreground and the Harbour of Granatello Beyond
Private Collection

The Coast at Salerno, with Arechi Castle Overlooking the Town
Private Collection

The View from Salerno, Looking towards Vietri sul Mare
Tate, London

An Unidentified Villa in a Valley near Vietri sul Mare
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

Salerno: An Ancient Cypress in the Garden of the Franciscan Convent
Tate, London

The Coast at Vietri sul Mare, from near Salerno
Victoria and Albert Museum, London

The Torre Crestarella at Vietri sul Mare, with Salerno in the Distance
Private Collection

The Cantilena Convent, near Vietri sul Mare
Tate, London

The Cantilena Convent, near Vietri sul Mare
Private Collection

The Convent of San Francesco at Cava de' Tirreni
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens, San Marino

Naples: The Fifteenth-Century City Walls, with the Dome of Santa Caterina a Formiello
The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City

View from the Road Leading to the Scuola di Virgilio, Showing Nisida, the Islands of Ischia and Procida, and the Promontory of Miseno
Private Collection, Norfolk

The Bay of Porto Paone, a Flooded Crater in the Islet of Nisida
Private Collection

Ancient Ruins on the Coast near the Point of Posillipo
Tate, London

Naples: The View from an Enclosed Road at Posillipo
Tate, London

Posillipo: The Palazzo di Roccella on the Shore
Private Collection

The Amphitheatre at Capua
Tate, London

A Ferry Crossing a River, on the Road between Eboli and Paestum
Tate, London

The View towards Salerno from the Road to Eboli
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

Naples: Castel Sant'Elmo
Tate, London

The Royal Park at Astroni
Private Collection

Lake Agnano, Seen from Astroni
Private Collection

Naples: An Unidentified Convent, with Vesuvius in the Distance
Tate, London

Naples: A Range of Convents near Capodimonte, Including the Chinese College
The Whitworth, The University of Manchester

The Vanvitelli Aqueduct, near Caserta
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Hobart

The Royal Palace at Caserta, Seen from the Road to the Vanvitelli Aqueduct
Private Collection

The Convent of Santa Lucia, near Caserta
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens, San Marino

The Convent of Santa Lucia, near Caserta
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

Ancient Ruins near the River Garigliano, Gaeta in the Distance
Private Collection

Florence: The Palazzo Vecchio, Seen from the Cascine Park
Tate, London

Florence: The Convent of Monte Oliveto, from the Banks of the Arno
Horne Museum, Florence

Florence: The Convent of Monte Oliveto, from the Banks of the Arno
Private Collection

A Villa on the Banks of the River Arno, Known as the Villa Salviati
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

A Building amongst Trees, on the River Arno near Florence
Sphinx Fine Art, London

A View on the River Arno, with a Tower on a Hill
Tate, London

Florence: The Palazzo Vecchio from the Boboli Gardens, with Fiesole in the Distance
Harrow School, London

Florence: The View from the Boboli Gardens across the Valley of the Arno
Private Collection

An Unidentified Villa, between Florence and Bologna
Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

A Wooded Shoreline on Lake Maggiore
Tate, London

Angera: The Borromeo Castle Overlooking Lake Maggiore
Tate, London

The Castle of Arona on Lake Maggiore
Private Collection

Lake Maggiore, from the Shore
Private Collection

Isola Bella on Lake Maggiore
Private Collection

Lake Maggiore, from Isola Bella
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven

A Distant View of the Grande Chartreuse
Private Collection

Buildings on a Promontory on the Coast at Posillipo
Private Collection

The Marmore Falls, near Terni
Private Collection

A Narrow Gorge Leading to the Grande Chartreuse
Private Collection

Florence: The View from the Grand Duke's Garden
Private Collection
Footnotes
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About this Work
This monochrome drawing is known only from a photograph in the Girtin Archive that is annotated by Thomas Girtin (1874–1960) as ‘By Girtin throughout’ (Girtin Archive, 12/10). The artist made several hundred pencil copies at the home of his patron Dr Thomas Monro (1759–1833) from myriad sources. Though his contemporary Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851) ‘washed in the effects’ in the majority of cases to create the distinctive Monro School drawings, there are inevitably a number of examples where his outlines were not touched on, or where he just lightly washed them himself (Farington, Diary, 12 November 1798).1 Works such as this were presumably amongst the items sold under Girtin’s name at Monro’s posthumous sale in 1833 as ‘Unfinished sketches’ or ‘Foreign views’ (Christie’s, 1 July 1833, lots 101 and 103), though it is also possible that they were produced by the artist as records of compositions for his own reference. This indeed might have been the case here, since it seems that Monro owned another, more finished version of the same composition (TG0747). The idea that the work was not produced for the patron is supported by the fact that it employs a coarse laid paper, rather than the fine wove that was invariably used for the Monro School watercolours. This was the support used in two similar works that appeared at the Squire Gallery in London in 1954 and 1955 as by Girtin, Part of Padua, Seen from the Walls (TG0705) and An Unidentified Mausoleum, Probably near Rome (TG0543), and together they formed a distinctive group.
As with the finished watercolour, this work is based on a composition that is known from an on-the-spot sketch by John Robert Cozens (1752–97), which is inscribed ‘Banks of ye Arno near Florence Sept.21 – from the Cascines’ (see figure 1), meaning that it was made on the return from the artist’s second trip to the Continent, in the autumn of 1783 (Bell and Girtin, 1935, no.386). The sketch is found in the sixth of the seven sketchbooks that are associated with a visit that began with a journey to Naples in the company of his patron William Beckford (1760–1844). It is unlikely that this version of the view of the convent of Monte Oliveti was copied directly from the sketch by Cozens, however. It would have been uncharacteristic of Beckford to have lent the sketchbooks to Monro, and the existence of a large number of tracings of their contents by Cozens himself suggests that the patron, rather than the artist, retained the books. An album put together by Sir George Beaumont (1753–1827), now in the collection of the Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, includes more than seventy tracings from on-the-spot drawings in the first three of the sketchbooks, and these provided the basis for at least thirty Monro School works. There are only five tracings from the next three books, but there is no reason to think that others did not exist, and it was presumably from these lost copies by Cozens that as many as thirty-five more watercolours were produced, including at least two other views of Florence (TG0747 and TG0752a) and two of the river Arno in its vicinity (TG0749 and TG0751). The fact that this work, as with all of the Monro School copies, does not follow either the shading or the distribution of light seen in the on-the-spot sketches, though it does replicate the basic outlines, further suggests that Girtin worked from a tracing of the sketchbook view.
1794 - 1797
Florence: The Convent of Monte Oliveto, from the Banks of the Arno
TG0747
1794 - 1797
Part of Padua, Seen from the Walls
TG0705
1794 - 1797
An Unidentified Mausoleum, Probably near Rome
TG0543
1794 - 1797
Florence: The Convent of Monte Oliveto, from the Banks of the Arno
TG0747
1794 - 1797
Florence: The View from the Boboli Gardens across the Valley of the Arno
TG0752a
1794 - 1797
A Villa on the Banks of the River Arno, Known as ‘The Villa Salviati’
TG0749
1794 - 1797
A View on the River Arno, with a Tower on a Hill
TG0751