La Citta della belle Torre - San Gimignano

George James Howard, 9th Earl of Carlisle was an aristocrat, Liberal politician, artist. He was a friend and important patron to a number of artists in the Pre-Raphaelite circle, being particularly close to Burne-Jones. As well as Naworth Castle near Carlisle and Castle Howard in Yorkshire, he lived at 1 Palace Green, Kensington, a house designed from him by Philip Webb and decorated by Burne-Jones and William Morris. Although largely self taught he did study for a while at Leigh’s under Alphonse Legros before meeting Giovanni Costa in 1866 and deciding to further his studies in Italy, working alongside Costa executing plein air watercolours of the Etruscan landscape. Howard exhibited at the Dudley Gallery from 1867 and also showed at the Grosvenor Gallery and New Gallery. As well as taking his subject matter from his family and friends and familiar haunts in Britain and his beloved Italy he travelled extensively producing watercolours and the occasional oil painting of Egypt, India, North Africa and elsewhere. Works by Howard are in many public collections including the Tate Gallery, York Art Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, Ashmolean Museum and the British Library as well as a large collection at Castle Howard. He died in 1911. The present work was one of three exhibited by the artist at the first exhibition of Sir Coutts Lindsay’s Grosvenor Gallery in 1877.