Joseph Mallord William Turner

With the sketchbook turned horizontally, Turner filled much of this page with studies of Paris’s monuments and their architectural details. The Arc de Triomphe, commissioned by Napoleon at the height of his success, features prominently at the centre of the page. The existence of this drawing suggests that Turner considered the subject as an illustration for Turner’s Annual Tour: Wanderings by the Loire and Seine (1833–5; later reissued as Rivers of France) or the new edition of Walter Scott’s Life of Napoleon Buonaparte (1834–36), although the landmark did not make it into either publication in the event.1