Italian Landscape

This Italian landscape by Corot, painted around 1825-28 on paper laid down on canvas, dates from his first transformative trip to Italy (1825-28). Corot's Italian sojourn was decisive for his artistic development; working en plein air in the brilliant Mediterranean light, he produced hundreds of oil sketches that rank among the finest landscape studies of the nineteenth century. These intimate works, many never exhibited in his lifetime, are now considered his greatest achievements.

The oil-on-paper technique allows for spontaneous, rapid execution capturing the fleeting effects of Italian light. Corot's palette is brighter and warmer than his later French landscapes, with clear tonal distinctions between sunlit and shadowed areas and the characteristic precision of his early architectural drawing.