Joseph Mallord William Turner

Turner worked gouache and watercolour paints onto this sheet of blue paper to depict a view across the port of Honfleur, Normandy from the high ground to the west. The expansive vista carries the eye from the wooded foreground, past the densely packed port area, and out to the wide embouchure of the Seine. This is one of seven colour studies of Honfleur which Turner worked up around this date with a view to potential publication; these are listed under the entry for Tate D24580 (Turner Bequest CCLIX 15). For the finished watercolour on this subject, see Tate D24700 (Turner Bequest CCLIX 135). All this activity culminated in an engraved illustration for the 1834 volume of Turner’s Annual Tour: Wanderings by the Loire and Seine (1833–5; later reissued as Rivers of France); see Tate impression T04707.

Technical notes:

The verso of this sheet is attached to the mount.