Joseph Mallord William Turner

The subject was drawn with the page turned horizontally. A finished watercolour of this subject is in the collection of the Royal Academy, London;1 it is severely faded. Turner made it for John Hoppner, RA (1758–1810), presumably in recognition of Hoppner’s support for his (unsuccessful) application for Associateship of the Academy in 1798. He executed one, presumably for similar reasons, for Joseph Farington (1747–1821), probably based on the drawing on folio 29 recto (D01084; Turner Bequest XXXV 82), though the exact relationship between sketch and finished work is debated. See also folio 14 recto (D01012; Turner Bequest XXXV 9), a subject apparently chosen by another Academician, Robert Smirke, for a watercolour that was never realised.

Verso:

Blank; stamped in brown ink with Turner Bequest monogram; inscribed by John Ruskin in brown ink ‘98’ (circled in pencil); ?in a later hand in blue crayon ‘20’; and by A.J. Finberg in pencil ‘141.15’.