Catalogue entry
The central sun here, reserved as a blank disk of white paper, appears to be low over water, probably the sea with what may be a stretch of wet beach in the foreground. Compare Tate
D25258 and
D25332 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII 136, 210) in particular, and for other ‘colour beginnings’ focusing on a centrally placed sun, see the Introduction to this subsection.
1 Compare also the effect of the low sun in a blaze of yellow in the topographical watercolour study
The Roman Campagna from Monte Testaccio, Sunset from the 1819
Naples, Rome C Studies sketchbook (Tate
D16131; Turner Bequest CLXXXVII 43).
2Andrew Wilton has compared the effect with that in
Margate from the Sea, Whiting Fishing of 1822 (private collection),
3 engraved in 1825 as
Sun-Rise. Whiting Fishing at Margate for Turner’s
Marine Views (Tate impression:
T06655), and dated this work to about 1825 in the context of the ‘Little Liber’ series landscape studies (see ‘Little Liber c.1823–6’ in the present catalogue);
4 Ian Warrell concurred, placing it a little later in the 1820s among similar works.
5
Paper conservator Peter Bower has identified the sheet as a watercolour paper made at the Bally, Ellen & Steart Mill, at the De Montalt Mill, Bath, Somerset, and observes that it is unusually lightweight in terms of other sheets Turner used by that maker. The full stops in the watermark differ from their customary commas, suggesting a different mould, while the position of the mark indicates the full size of the sheet had been Royal (averaging 610 x 483 mm; 24 x 19 inches) or Super Royal (686 x 483 mm; 27 x 19 inches) rather than the Imperial (559 x 762 mm; 22 x 30 inches) Bally, Ellen & Steart sheets Turner habitually used.
1
Blank; not available for inspection at time of writing.
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