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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Northern France c.1826-32 > Nantes, Angers and Saumur Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Montjean-sur-Loire; Barges, Loire Valley 1826

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Montjean-sur-Loire; Barges, Loire Valley’ 1826
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 22 Verso:
Montjean-sur-Loire; Barges, Loire Valley 1826
D23193
Turner Bequest CCXLVIII 22a
Pencil on white laid paper, 170 x 110 mm
Partial unidentified watermark
Inscribed ‘M[...]djean’ top centre, ‘Ex L[...] and Rt’ centre
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘26’ bottom left inverted and ‘355’ top left inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner filled this page with distant easterly views of the settlement of Montjean-sur-Loire, perched on its three hills overlooking the River Loire. There are several pages of studies of this location in this volume which are listed in the sketchbook introduction. Turner has paid particular attention here to the sailed barges distinctive to the Loire Valley.1 He subsequently used local rivercraft to enliven his views of the river which he worked up for printed reproduction in The Keepsake annual (1831) and Turner’s Annual Tour: Wanderings by the Loire and Seine (1833–5; later reissued as Rivers of France).2 For examples, see Tate impressions T05107 and T04689.

John Chu
April 2015

1
Ian Warrell, Turner on the Loire, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1997, pp. 64–7
2
Luke Herrmann, Turner Prints: The Engraved Work of J.M.W. Turner, Oxford 1990, pp. 164–6, 171–83.

How to cite

John Chu, ‘Montjean-sur-Loire; Barges, Loire Valley 1826 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2015, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2017, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-montjean-sur-loire-barges-loire-valley-r1185025, accessed 23 April 2024.