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

With the sketchbook turned horizontally, Turner filled most of this page with a view of the large pleasure pavilion known as the Grand Trianon at the Palace of Versailles, located some twelve miles south-west of central Paris. The building is characterised by a continuous balustrade along the roofline and a single-storey facade divided by alternating arches and columns. In this sketch these features are shown from below and seen through trees. Turner made numerous sketches of the Versailles palace complex in the present volume, a list of which is provided in the sketchbook Introduction. The existence of so many studies suggests that Turner considered Versailles as a subject for an illustration for a new edition of Walter Scott’s Life of Napoleon Buonaparte (1834–36) although it was not included in the publication in the event.1