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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Marine subjects c.1803-14 > Nelson Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Study for 'The Battle of Trafalgar, as Seen from the Mizen Starboard Shrouds of the Victory', and Other Studies 1805

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Study for 'The Battle of Trafalgar, as Seen from the Mizen Starboard Shrouds of the Victory', and Other Studies’ 1805
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 28 Recto:
Study for ‘The Battle of Trafalgar, as Seen from the Mizen Starboard Shrouds of the Victory’, and Other Studies 1805
D05472
Turner Bequest LXXXIX 21
Pencil on white wove paper, 114 x 184 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘B | W | R’ within lower flag at left, ‘Union Jack FJG flag by Gib Boom’ [Finberg: ‘F.T.G. Stay’] across top and ‘Red’ lower right
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘21’ top left, inverted
Stamped in black ‘LXXXIX 21’ top left, inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Drawn with the sketchbook inverted, this is a continuation of the rough sketch on folio 27 verso (D05471; Turner Bequest LXXXIX 20a) for which see catalogue entry. It extends the composition to the left to include a smaller ship and the huge hull and lofty stern cabins of the Spanish flagship Santissima Trinidad, whose famous four tiers of guns are indicated (see also folio 21 verso, D05458; Turner Bequest LXXXIX 12). In Turner’s picture, The Battle of Trafalgar, as Seen from the Mizen Starboard Shrouds of the Victory, exhibited at Turner’s Gallery in 1806 (Tate N00480;1 see the Introduction to this sketchbook), the Union Jack belonging to a British ship otherwise largely obscured by smoke is visible to right of the Santissima Trinidad’s stern. It flies near the Spaniard’s mizzen gaff, not her jib boom (which would be attached to the bowsprit).

David Blayney Brown
March 2006

1
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, p.46 no.58 (pl.68).

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Study for ‘The Battle of Trafalgar, as Seen from the Mizen Starboard Shrouds of the Victory’, and Other Studies 1805 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2006, 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-study-for-the-battle-of-trafalgar-as-seen-from-the-mizen-r1139282, accessed 26 April 2024.