Landscape near Chiusi, Tuscany

Art Historical Context

In this compact oil painting, a rocky foreground of scattered boulders and sunlit grass opens onto a winding valley. Dark clusters of trees and sheer cliffs frame the view, while rolling hills and faint blue mountains recede toward a pale sky. The artist uses warm earth tones—ochres, browns, and muted greens—applied with careful brushwork that gives weight to each stone and texture to the dry terrain. Alexandre Desgoffe painted *Landscape near Chiusi, Tuscany* in 1841. The small canvas records a specific corner of the Italian countryside with quiet precision, inviting viewers to linger over the play of light across the hills. Today it hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago’s collection of European paintings, offering a window onto nineteenth-century travel and the enduring appeal of the Tuscan landscape.