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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Second Italian Tour 1828-9 > Marseilles to Genoa Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Nice, from the Sea 1828

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Nice, from the Sea’ 1828
Folio 7 Recto:
Nice, from the Sea 1828
D21145
Turner Bequest CCXXXI 7
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 174 mm
Inscribed in red ink ‘7’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCXXXI 7’ bottom left, descending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner made a number of sketches documenting his arrival by boat in Nice. This example, with the page turned horizontally, represents a view from the sea looking north towards the city and its surrounding coastline with the hills and mountains of the Alpes-maritimes rising in the background. In the centre of the composition is the hill overlooking the eastern perimeter of Nice, known as the ‘Château’, and, on the right, is the entrance to the port.1 Maurice Guillaud has described the structures visible here as ‘the only buildings standing here at that time, the houses of R[au]ba Capeu’.2
Similar sketches can be found on folio 6 verso opposite and the verso (D21144, D21146).

Nicola Moorby
March 2017

Revised by Hannah Kaspar
November 2024

1
See Guillaud, Alfrey, Wilton and others 1981, p.285; see also Roland Courtot, ‘Les Carnets de William Turner: Recherches d’identification et de localisation des dessins’, unpublished research notes, Université de Provence à Aix, April 2008, p.3, as ‘Nice’ (shared with former Tate cataloguer Nicola Moorby in email correspondence at that date).
2
Guillaud, Alfrey, Wilton and others 1981, p.285.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Nice, from the Sea 1828’, catalogue entry, March 2017, revised by Hannah Kaspar, November 2024, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, February 2025, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/nice-from-the-sea-r1209823, accessed 12 May 2025.