Joseph Mallord William Turner

The Mosel Bridge at Coblenz: Colour Study

c.1841–2

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In Tate Britain

Prints and Drawings Room

View by appointment
Artist
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Medium
Gouache and watercolour on paper
Dimensions
Support: 246 x 348 mm
Collection
Tate
Acquisition
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Reference
D36194
Turner Bequest CCCLXIV 336

Display caption

Turner often passed along the Rhine on his Swiss tours of the 1840s and worked on his drawings of Coblenz and Ehrenbreitstein during the same period as his famous late depictions of the Rigi seen across Lake Lucerne. No.135 is a preparatory study for no.136, with the same colours used in a much simpler and more spontaneous way and with a less rigorously organised composition. No.136 is one of more than twenty 'sample studies' produced in the 1840s for Turner's agent Thomas Griffith to show to potential patrons in order to attract commissions. Ruskin ordered a watercolour based on this study which is today known only through copies made by his pupils.

Gallery label, September 2004

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