Joseph Mallord William Turner

This is a pencil drawing on off-white wove paper. The drawing is linear in style and contains minimal shading. Although it was swiftly sketched careful attention has been given to the architectural details of the mausoleum. A single graphite pencil has been used to create this composition but Turner has applied greater pressure when drawing the foreground (making the lines in this area the darkest in the picture); the background, by comparison, is more lightly drawn. This technique was often used by Turner to create the illusion of depth and distance in his sketches.

Along the left-hand edge there is evidence that this sketch was originally part of a sketchbook. The sheet has been roughly cut from the book and at the bottom of this edge a hole is visible where the sheet was attached to the binding. Further up the page two nicks in the paper indicate where other binding holes were.