Joseph Mallord William Turner

Along with three technically similar blue paper drawings (Tate D20818, D24843, D24846; Turner Bequest CCXXVII a 15, CCLX 7, 10) this is a preliminary study for Turner’s large painting Dido Directing the Equipment of the Fleet, or The Morning of the Carthaginian Empire, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1828 (Tate N00506).1 While Finberg had recognised the subject of D20818,2 the remaining three, possibly sight unseen, had been grouped with blue paper subjects ‘mostly connected with “French River” series’,3 having been displayed in that context in the nineteenth century. As acknowledged by Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, Jerrold Ziff was the first to recognise the subject of the current work and D24843;4 with their figures and quite elaborately articulated architecture, the two variations are the most developed of the four.

For general comments on the subject and Andrew Wilton’s remarks on the four drawings as related to Turner’s own early drawings and his ‘Old Master’ models,5 see the Introduction to this subsection.

Technical notes:

There is extensive use of white chalk in the sky and its reflection. The tonal areas at the left appear to have become discoloured.

Verso:

Blank; inscribed in pencil ‘CCLX – 8’ bottom centre.