J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner London Bridge c.1825

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 76 Recto:
London Bridge circa 1825
D07115
Turner Bequest CV 83
Pencil on white wove paper, 108 x 185 mm
Stamped in black ‘CV 83’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Listed by Finberg as one of batch of ‘loose leaves appear[ing] to belong to this book’ this was rebound as folio 76 so that the subject, drawn inverted, aligns with its continuation on folio 75 verso (D07083; Turner Bequest CV 66a) and forms a panoramic sweep of the Thames from the Custom House on the north bank to the Bermondsey bank on the south. Here, London Bridge runs between St. Paul’s Cathedral to the towers of the Shot Manufactory and St Olave’s Church in Bermondsey. This careful drawing, detailed in its depiction of the bridge, is clearly related to the watercolour Old London Bridge (Victoria and Albert Museum, London)1 dated 1824 and engraved by Edward Goodall, although there are a number of perhaps more closely related sketches in the Old London Bridge sketchbook (Tate Turner Bequest CCV ).
See Introduction to the sketchbook for plans in the mid 1820s for a series of London subjects, including this subject, the Custom House and the Tower.
1
Andrew Wilton, The Life and Work of J.M.W. Turner, Fribourg 1979, p.358 no.514, as ‘The Port of London’.
Verso:
Blank

David Blayney Brown
June 2010

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘London Bridge c.1825 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-london-bridge-r1134618, accessed 28 March 2024.