Lionel’s love affair with Italy began in 1959 during his visit to Umbria and Tuscany as an architectural student. Other visits followed, during the course of his studies, including to Venice and Rome. His enthusiasm for Italian landscape, art and architecture has been further consummated in later years through working visits, in preparation for exhibitions of his paintings.

This book is a celebration of his travels and experiences throughout this hallowed land, where the physical beauty of the landscape is more than matched by the abundance of great works of art. These are evident in the remotest and poorest villages, as well as in the great Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque cities.

You are invited to join Lionel and his wife Anne (an artist specializing in cats) on a typical return journey from their home in Crediton, Devon, through France, Liguria, Piedmont,Tuscany, Umbria, Lazio, Campania, right down to Basilicata and Puglia in the heel of Italy.

Lionel draws attention to the similarities between the beautiful farmland of Mid Devon, referred to by Chef Christopher Archambault, as the ‘Tuscany of England’, and the man-managed landscape of both Umbria and Tuscany, which remain as depicted in Giotto’s frescoes.

Lionel’s interpretations of Puglia, Umbria,Tuscany and Venice are revealed with over 200 paintings and diary sketches. Many of the visits were made during spring, and therefore no apologies are made for the profusion and occasional riot of colour where fresh young greens contrast with vivid carpets of poppies and, later in the year, the vines themselves produce their sensational autumnal blaze.

Lionel Aggett set aside his 24-year professional career as a qualified architect in 1991 to paint full time. He exhibits with W.H. Patterson, Manya Igel and Llewellyn Alexander in London and provincially with John Davies in Stow-on-the-Wold,The Walker Galleries in Harrogate and Sidbury, Sarah Samuels in Chester, Cove’s Quay Gallery in Salcombe and the Waterside Gallery, St Ives. He is a member of the prestigious Pastel Society, an academician of the South West Academy, a member of STISA and the London Arts Club. He is author of six books including Andalucia & Las Alpujarras,The Heart of Devon and France for Halsgrove and has contributed to nine other titles, as well as several art magazines.

ISBN 978 184114 606 5, hardback, 238x258mm, 160 pages. Published August 2007.