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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > French Tour 1821 > Paris, Seine and Dieppe Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Boats Sailing off Coast; Also Torso of Nude Female 1821

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Boats Sailing off Coast; Also Torso of Nude Female’ 1821
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 28 Recto:
Boats Sailing off Coast; Also Torso of Nude Female 1821
D18567
Turner Bequest CCXI 28
Pencil on white wove paper, 189 x 113 mm
Inscribed in red ink by John Ruskin ‘28’ top right running vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCXI – 28’ top right running vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Drawn at the head of the page is a sketch of two sailing boats on a choppy sea with cliffs beyond that may belong to a sequence of sketches of the coast and shipping on folios 25, 26, 27 and 28 (Tate D18561, D18563, D18565, D18567; Turner Bequest CCXI 25, 26, 27, 28); although the original order of pages in this sketchbook is questionable (see sketchbook Introduction). For a full list of Turner’s sketches of shipping in this book, see folio 1 (D18525; Turner Bequest CCXI 1).
With the sketchbook turned to the left is a sketch of a faint outline of the torso of a nude figure. There is another sketch of the same figure in a similar pose, partially covered by a red cloth painted with watercolour on the reverse of this page: Tate D18568 (Turner Bequest CCXI 28).1

Thomas Ardill
February 2013

1
Warrell 2003, p.22.

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Boats Sailing off Coast; Also Torso of Nude Female 1821 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, August 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-boats-sailing-off-coast-also-torso-of-nude-female-r1146263, accessed 26 April 2024.