Joseph Mallord William Turner

Lyon from the River Saône to the South

1820

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In Tate Britain

Prints and Drawings Room

View by appointment
Artist
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Part of
Return from Italy Sketchbook
Medium
Graphite on paper
Dimensions
Support: 98 × 128 mm
Collection
Tate
Acquisition
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Reference
D16714
Turner Bequest CXCII 37 a

Catalogue entry

This page contains two views of Lyon seen from the south of the city. Turner’s viewpoint is the banks of the River Saône near its confluence with the River Rhône. The lower prospect depicts the view looking north into the heart of the city with the Fourvière hill on the left and the Pont du Change connecting the old town (the Vieux Lyon), with the Presqu’île peninsula to the right. The upper vista meanwhile represents the other side of the Presqu’île with the Rhône on the right. The artist has also made a note of an incidental detail he witnessed of horses towing boats along the river, ‘2 abreast’.

For further sketches of Lyon see folio 37 verso (D16712; Turner Bequest CXCII 36a).
Finberg noted that a leaf had been torn out after this point in the sketchbook.1

Nicola Moorby
April 2013

1
Finberg 1909, p.572.

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