J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Scotland 1801-10 > Dunbar Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A Breaking Wave 1801

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Breaking Wave’ 1801
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 110 Verso:
A Breaking Wave 1801
D02798
Turner Bequest LIV 110a
Pencil and wash with scraping-out on white wove paper prepared with a mauve-pink ground, 115 x 164 mm
Stamped in black with Turner Bequest monogram bottom left
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘2’ bottom left, upside down
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This drawing is one of a series of studies of breaking waves between folios 109 recto and 116 verso (D02796–D02810); see also folio 3 verso (D02618) and the entry for folio 16 recto (D02809).
Finberg plausibly suggests that this subject is continued on folio 116 verso (D02810);1 Ruskin’s numbering corroborates this, the present page being inscribed ‘2’ and the other ‘3’.
1
See Finberg 1909, I, p.140.
Technical notes:
Folios 109–116 (D02796–D02810) probably belonged originally between folios 33 and 34 (D02649, D02650); see the technical notes to the sketchbook’s Introduction.

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘A Breaking Wave 1801 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, April 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-a-breaking-wave-r1178984, accessed 25 July 2025.