In the absence of any identifying features it is difficult to decipher the exact location Turner represents in this drawing, however Turner scholar Eric Shanes has proposed that it may be either a study for
Ramsgate in the
Ports of England series (Tate
D18150; Turner Bequest CCVIII Q) or a sea and sky study.
1The sea is rendered with shades of blue, grey, and pale green wash heightened with a trace of dilute red at the bottom. These colours have been applied onto saturated paper, allowing them to merge and diffuse into gentle gradients. A band of dark blue sharply defines the horizon. The sky is more vigorously handled, with gestural hatching of grey and blue wash to suggest cloud formations.
The drawing was produced on the same sheet as another seascape because, as Gerald Wilkinson points out, part of the top of this drawing appears at the top of the drawing which would have been positioned to its left (Tate
D25404; CCLXIII 281).
2
