Payne's Grey · 2026

“Porta a Montepulciano”

An old studded door in Montepulciano, set deep in its stone arch — the kind of doorway you stop in front of without quite knowing why.

Details

TitlePorta a Montepulciano

PlaceMontepulciano, Tuscany

Year2026

CategoryPayne's Grey

Dimensions14.8 × 21 cm (A5)

TechniqueInk and Payne's grey watercolour on Clairefontaine paper

Palette of the work

Request information

This piece is part of my collection. Originals will soon be available to buy online — write to me in the meantime.

The subject

A Gate into Montepulciano

Montepulciano, the great wine town of southern Tuscany, is still entered the old way — through stone gates in its medieval walls. This drawing is one of those thresholds, an arch where the town begins.

Set high on a long limestone ridge, Montepulciano guards itself with ring-walls and fortified gates — the Porta al Prato chief among them, remodelled by Antonio da Sangallo in the sixteenth century. You pass under the arch and the modern road is suddenly behind you.

I have always liked gates: they are the exact moment a town decides to let you in.

In grey, the arch becomes a study in light and dark — the bright street outside, the cool shadow under the stone.

Town: Montepulciano, Tuscany
On: a limestone ridge
Chief gate: Porta al Prato
Wine: Vino Nobile
Known for: its medieval walls

The Porta al Prato, a fortified gate of Montepulciano — The Porta al Prato — the chief gate into Montepulciano.Photo: János Korom Dr. >17 Million views from Wien, Austria — CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Looking through a stone gate arch in Montepulciano — Through the arch — the dark cool of the gateway, the town beyond.Photo: János Korom Dr. >17 Million views from Wien, Austria — CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

A gate is the handshake of a town — I drew the arch and the dark cool beyond it.

Ink for the voussoirs and the rough stone courses, a grey wash for the shadow swallowing the lane within.

It is a small subject that holds a large feeling: the step from the road into the Middle Ages.