Joseph Mallord William Turner

A Curtained Bed, ?with a Figure or Figures

c.1834–6

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Not on display

Artist
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Part of
Colour Studies (2) Sketchbook [Finberg CCXCI (c)]
Medium
Watercolour on paper
Dimensions
Support: 79 × 101 mm
Collection
Tate
Acquisition
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Reference
D28902
Turner Bequest CCXCI c 20

Catalogue entry

Inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, a curtained bed is indicated with what may be a figure reclining within with the head to the left; the marks at the right could indicate another figure, although these readings are open to interpretation.
For a discussion of the improvisatory and often erotic nature of the watercolour studies making up most of this sketchbook, see the Introduction.
Technical notes:
The unaccessioned recto is numbered in red ink ‘20’ and stamped ‘CCXCI(c) – 20’; it is blank apart from slight watercolour offsetting at the gutter and in general from folio 19 verso (D28900).

Matthew Imms
May 2014

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