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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and French ... > Holland, Meuse and Cologne Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Boulogne from the Harbour 1825

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Boulogne from the Harbour’ 1825
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 78 Recto:
Boulogne from the Harbour 1825
D19532
Turner Bequest CCXV 78
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Partial watermark ‘lee | 19’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘G’ ‘WG’, ‘WGS’ and ‘GW’ below centre, under houses, and ‘s’ twice, right of centre, on roofs
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘78’ bottom left and ‘277’ top left, both upside down
Stamped in black ‘CCXV – 78’ top left, upside down
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Finberg later amended his 1909 Inventory entry (‘Boulogne-sur-Mer (?)’), crossing through the question mark.1 The Turner scholar C.F. Bell marked another copy in the same way.2 The setting is indeed Boulogne, looking east from the harbour; the panorama continues to the right on folio 77 verso opposite (D19531). Here, quayside houses are shown below windmills on the headland north of the harbour. Later developments and severe damage in the Second World War mean that nothing remains recognisable of what Turner recorded. Folio 13 verso (D19423) is a variant of the overall view.
Among others there, much the same view is shown on Tate D19325 (Turner Bequest CCXIV 244a) in the contemporary Holland sketchbook. There is also a slight reprise on the verso (D19533), as a backdrop to moored boats. For other Boulogne subjects, see under folio 8 verso (D19416).

Matthew Imms
September 2020

1
Undated MS note by Finberg (died 1939) in interleaved copy of Finberg 1909, Prints and Drawings Room, Tate Britain, II, p.664.
2
Undated MS note by Bell (died 1966) in copy of Finberg 1909, Prints and Drawings Room, Tate Britain, II, p.664.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Boulogne from the Harbour 1825 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2020, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2023, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-boulogne-from-the-harbour-r1202872, accessed 09 June 2025.