The South Façade of Warwick Castle

This 1748 view of Warwick Castle's south facade, in the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum in Madrid, is one of two large paintings Canaletto made of the castle for Francis Greville, Earl of Warwick — complementing the east-front-from-courtyard view now in the Birmingham Museums Trust. The south facade, seen across the grassy slopes above the River Avon, presented Canaletto with a dramatic medieval silhouette very different from anything in Venice: Caesar's Tower and Guy's Tower rising against the Warwickshire sky, their medieval battlements and massive stonework representing an English Gothic aesthetic that had no Venetian equivalent. Canaletto's ability to adapt his precise Venetian topographical method to this utterly different architectural subject demonstrates the versatility that sustained his English career through nearly a decade of commissions from aristocratic patrons. The Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, assembled by the Thyssen-Bornemisza dynasty across the twentieth century and opened to the public in Madrid in 1992, holds one of the world's most comprehensive private art collections including strong representation of old masters alongside its celebrated twentieth-century holdings — an unexpected home for a view of an English medieval castle rendered by Venice's greatest view painter.

The castle's imposing medieval walls and towers are rendered with topographical precision from across the river. The English landscape setting with its green banks and overarching sky demonstrates Canaletto's adaptation to local conditions.