Italian Landscape with Bridge and Tower

Some years after his first extensive tour of the country, Turner made a number of unfinished oil studies of landscapes inspired by Italian subjects (see also Tivoli, the Cascatelle, hanging nearby). The works were freely painted on a continuous roll of canvas, tacked onto a small stretcher.

The location represented in this painting is unidentified but the hazy blue background, the aqueduct or bridge in the centre, and the tree dominating the right hand foreground, are all elements inspired by classical Italianate compositions. Turner had inherited this tradition from artists such as Claude Lorrain (about 1600-82) and Richard Wilson (1713-82).