Joseph Mallord William Turner The South-West Bend of the Grand Canal, Venice, with the Ca' Rezzonico, Palazzi Balbi, Morolin, Grassi and Malipiero, and Church of San Samuele 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 71 Recto:
The South-West Bend of the Grand Canal, Venice, with the Ca’ Rezzonico, Palazzi Balbi, Morolin, Grassi and Malipiero, and Church of San Samuele 1819
D14451
Turner Bequest CLXXV 71
Turner Bequest CLXXV 71
Pencil on white wove paper, 112 x 185 mm
Partial watermark ‘Al | 18’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Yelow [sic] | [?Shadw]’ towards top centre, beside buildings, ‘w’ towards bottom right, on balcony, ‘Pallazzo’ and ‘Manino’ twice towards bottom right, and ‘Chesa [?Far] | Frari’ bottom right
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘70’ bottom left, upside down and ‘300’ top left, upside down
Stamped in black ‘CLXXV 71’ top left, upside down
Partial watermark ‘Al | 18’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Yelow [sic] | [?Shadw]’ towards top centre, beside buildings, ‘w’ towards bottom right, on balcony, ‘Pallazzo’ and ‘Manino’ twice towards bottom right, and ‘Chesa [?Far] | Frari’ bottom right
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘70’ bottom left, upside down and ‘300’ top left, upside down
Stamped in black ‘CLXXV 71’ top left, upside down
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
References
1909
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.I, p.514, CLXXV 71, as ‘Looking up the Grand Canal from near the Accademia di Belle Arti; showing the Palazzo Balbi and the Tower of the Frari on the left, with the Palazzo Garzoni (the French Consulate), Palazzo Grassi, &c., and the Campanile of S. Stefano on the right’.
1910
Alexander J. Finberg, Turner’s Sketches and Drawings, London 1910, pl.XLVIII, as ‘Looking up the Grand Canal, Venice, from near the Accademia di Belle Arti’ (cropped to main view).
1930
A.J. Finberg, In Venice with Turner, London 1930, pp.42, 165, as ‘The Bend of the Canal, from the mouth of the Calle dei Cerchieri. “Chiesa Frari”, “Palazzo Balbi”, “Consul France”, etc.’, pl.VI, as ‘The Bend of the Canal’ (cropped to continuation of main view, excluding its foreground and three fifths of page).
1985
Lindsay Stainton, Turner’s Venice, London 1985, pp.13, 14, fig.2, as half of ‘TB CLXXV–71a, 72’ (sic), ‘The Grand Canal’.
1993
Robert Upstone, Sketchbooks of the Romantics, reprint ed., London 1993, p.90 reproduced.
Inverted relative to the sketchbooks foliation, the main drawing continues across folio 70 verso opposite (D14450), where Turner looks north to the Palazzo Balbi and ranges north-eastwards past the church of San Samuele on the opposite side. Finberg subsequently annotated his detailed 1909 Inventory entry (‘Looking up the Grand Canal from near the Accademia di Belle Arti; showing the Palazzo Balbi and the Tower of the Frari on the left, with the Palazzo Garzoni (the French Consulate), Palazzo Grassi, &c., and the Campanile of S. Stefano on the right’), bracketing ‘70a’ and ‘71’ as ‘From steps of the Calle dei Cerchieri’.1 The Turner scholar C.F. Bell marked another copy, crossing out ‘Balbi’ and writing ‘Rezzonico’.2
As Finberg established, the viewpoint is the waterfront end of the Calle dei Cerchieri, with the Palazzo Moro lightly indicated in the immediate foreground, and smaller buildings on the Fondamenta del Traghetto before the bulky classical façade of the Ca’ Rezzonico, now a museum of eighteenth-century Venice; almost hidden at the gutter before the canal turns right and the view continues on the other page is the campanile of the Frari (the church of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari).3 For various commentators’ remarks on this elaborate and assured double-page drawing, see under D14450.
For other studies of boats in this sketchbook, see under folio 37 recto (D14383), and for drawings made in the vicinity and an overview of Turner’s coverage of Venice, see the sketchbook’s Introduction.
Matthew Imms
March 2017
How to cite
Matthew Imms, ‘The South-West Bend of the Grand Canal, Venice, with the Ca’ Rezzonico, Palazzi Balbi, Morolin, Grassi and Malipiero, and Church of San Samuele 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2017, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, July 2017, https://www