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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Normandy ?1829 > Tancarville and Lillebonne Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Honfleur, with the Lieutenancy Building and Church of Sainte-Catherine ?1829

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Honfleur, with the Lieutenancy Building and Church of Sainte-Catherine’ ?1829
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 18 Recto:
Honfleur, with the Lieutenancy Building and Church of Sainte-Catherine ?1829
D23732
Turner Bequest CCLIII 18
Pencil on pale cream laid paper, 107 x 156 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘18’ top right ascending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCLIII – 18’ top right ascending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The page contains a large sketch, drawn horizontally, of a picturesque group of buildings. Finberg noted it simply as ‘Group of houses, &c.’,1 but the location has been identified as Honfleur.2 (For further information on Honfleur see under folio 1 recto, D23699.) Turner picks out the porticoed entrance doorway of the building on the right, and conveys the tower and belfry of the building at centre, the shapes and relative positions of these buildings making them further identifiable as the Lieutenancy building, and Church of Sainte-Catherine respectively, at Honfleur. (For information on the former see under folio 14 verso; D23725.)
Art historians Maurice Guillaud3 and Ian Warrell4 note that this sketch, albeit from a slightly different angle, was the likely basis for Turner’s watercolours The Lieutenancy Building and Church of Sainte-Catherine at Honfleur, Normandy, c.1832 (Tate D24749; Turner Bequest CCLIX 184), and The Lieutenancy Building and Church of Sainte-Catherine at Honfleur, Normandy, of about the same date (Tate D24649; Turner Bequest CCLIX 84). Warrell also states that this sketch was the source for Turner’s watercolour The Lieutenancy Building at Honfleur, Normandy, c.1832 (Tate D29016; Turner Bequest CCXCII 65), and also, along with folio 15 recto (D23726), for the watercolour The Lieutenancy Building at Honfleur, Normandy, c.1832 (Tate D24641; Turner Bequest CCLIX 76).
1
Finberg 1909, II, p.768.
2
Guillaud and others, Turner en France, Paris 1981, fig.659, p.325; Warrell 1999, pp.110, 114, 259 note 34, p.260 note 40, p.269 cats.70, 71 and 72; ?Ian Warrell, ‘Turner on the Seine: Topographical Index’, c.1999, Prints and Drawings Room, Tate Britain (printout in copy of Warrell 1999), p.3.
3
Guillaud and others 1981, fig.659, p.323.
4
Warrell 1999, pp.110, 114, 259 note 34, p.260 note 40, p.269 cats.70, 71 and 72.
Technical notes:
A small rust-coloured stain appears at upper right of the page.

Caroline South
May 2017

How to cite

Caroline South, ‘Honfleur, with the Lieutenancy Building and Church of Sainte-Catherine ?1829 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2017, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2019, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-honfleur-with-the-lieutenancy-building-and-church-of-sainte-r1195638, accessed 23 April 2024.