'The Custom House and Monument', Joseph Mallord William Turner

Artwork details

Artist

Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775‑1851)

Title

The Custom House and Monument

From Tabley No.3 Sketchbook

Turner Bequest CV

Date c.1825

MediumGraphite on paper

Dimensionssupport: 108 x 185 mm

Collection

Tate

Acquisition Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

Reference

D07039

Turner Bequest CV 40 a

View this artwork by appointment, at Tate Britain's Prints and Drawings Rooms

Turner's sketchbooks

View this artwork in the Tabley No.3 Sketchbook

Catalogue entry

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851

Folio 44 Verso:

The Custom House and Monument circa 1825

D07039
Turner Bequest CV 40a

Pencil on white wove paper, 108 x 185 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘white’, ‘GMB’, ‘E to HLR’ left and ‘GMB’ upper right

Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

References

Drawn with the sketchbook inverted, the subject is continued on folio 45 (D07040; Turner Bequest CV 41).

See Introduction to the sketchbook for plans in the mid 1820s for a series of London subjects, including the Custom House. As in many drawings in the book, the composition is similar to The Custom House (Vancouver Art Gallery),1 engraved by J.C. Allen, 1827. In this drawing, there is sufficient detail to recognise the new central façade added by Robert Smirke in 1825 to the earlier building by David Laing. For a more detailed drawing see folio 75 verso (D07083; Turner Bequest CV 66a). The Monument appears behind the Custom House.

David Blayney Brown
June 2010

Andrew Wilton, The Life and Work of J.M.W. Turner, Fribourg 1979, pp.358–9 no.516.

Read this catalogue entry in full

This catalogue entry is part of: David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, December 2012.