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

The page was used both ways round to record various aspects of Antwerp’s Sint-Pauluskerk (St Paul’s). Of the two horizontal views, the one taking up the left-hand half looks due south from today’s Nosestraat, shown on French-language maps of the time as the Rue des Nez; Turner presumably transcribed his note of the latter version from a street sign. The Gothic west end of the church is hemmed in by houses along the narrow street in the foreground, while the soaring profile of Antwerp Cathedral is lightly outlined in the distance.

To the right, the Gothic church is shown obliquely from the south-west, from far end of the small Veemarkt square. The lack of detail along the nave may indicate haste or trees obscuring the view, as is the case today. At any event, greater care is reserved for its later Baroque spire, just beyond the south transept; Turner drew it here and there from further off, for example on folio 194 recto (D19224). Down the right-hand (lower) edge beside the spire, he noted ‘Vee Markt’ and ‘March de Betail’ (marché au bétail), the Dutch and French equivalents for a livestock market, again presumably from adjacent signage. The centre of the square is now a sports pitch.

Squeezed in at right-angles to the left of the tower, another view looks head-on to the Baroque portal to the churchyard, set diagonally between stone-dressed, red-brick façades at the south-east corner of the Veemarkt. To its left, Nosestraat runs north, back past the west door of the church. The left-hand part of this view corresponds with a detailed 1844 drawing by William Callow (Tate A00152); for Turner’s other views of Antwerp here and elsewhere, see under folio 188 recto (D19212).