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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Switzerland 1802 > Small Calais Pier Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A Cutter and Fishing Boats 1802

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Cutter and Fishing Boats’ 1802
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Second Flyleaf, Recto:
A Cutter and Fishing Boats 1802
D04191
Pencil on white laid paper, 112 x 187 mm
Stamped in black ‘LXXI’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Finberg lists this as the first flyleaf, but it is now bound as the second. The white paper was not treated with any preparatory wash. The two principal boats in this sketch seem to have suggested the main grouping of the arriving English packet and the French fishing boat in Calais Pier, with French Poissards Preparing for Sea: an English Packet Arriving, which Turner painted for the Royal Academy in 1803 (National Gallery, London).1 While Turner presumably made general reference to this sketchbook while designing the picture, this sketch appears to show the closest connection with the composition.
There is staining, probably from damp, around the top and right margins.
1
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, pp.37–8 no.48 (pl.58).
Verso:
Blank

David Blayney Brown
April 2003

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘A Cutter and Fishing Boats 1802 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2003, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-a-cutter-and-fishing-boats-r1133745, accessed 26 April 2024.