Joseph Mallord William Turner

A Classical Harbour

c.1822–3

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In Tate Britain

Prints and Drawings Room

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Artist: Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Part of: Ports of England Sketchbook
Medium: Graphite on paper
Dimensions: Support: 257 x 178 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Reference: D17745
Turner Bequest CCII 25 a

Catalogue entry

With the sketchbook turned upside down relative to the foliation this drawing occupies the left side of the upper register. Shipping appears to flank either side of the composition as if docked at a harbour with the sun or moon centrally placed above them. The drawing is similar in layout to the Claudian-styled depiction of a harbour with vessels on folio 6 of this sketchbook (Tate D17725; Turner Bequest CCII 6). It is the format of the drawing, then, that probably led the Turner scholars Martin Butlin, Andrew Wilton and John Gage to believe it to be a sketch of a classical composition, probably a harbour embarkation scene.1

Alice Rylance-Watson
March 2013

Butlin, Wilton and Gage 1974, p.97, no.260

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