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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Copy-Drawings 1794-8 > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Houses and Boats at Gravesend 1796

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Houses and Boats at Gravesend’ 1796
Houses and Boats at Gravesend 1796
D00680
Turner Bequest XXVII S
Pencil and watercolour on white wove paper, 210 x 271 mm
Inscribed by Turner with brush and ochre colour ‘GRAVESEND | 1796’ and ‘TURNER’ on sails
Stamped in black ‘XXVII S’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Verso:
Blank; inscribed by Turner with brush and grey colour ‘46’; inscribed, possibly not by Turner, in pen and brown ink ‘Turner Er’; paint trials and smears; stamped in brown ink with Turner Bequest monogram. The artist’s name is inscribed here with a fine pen and light brown ink, the second syllable repeated with the enlarged Greek ‘e’ often used by Turner when signing work in the 1790s; this ‘signature’ may have been copied from elsewhere by a pupil.

Andrew Wilton
April 2012

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Houses and Boats at Gravesend 1796’, catalogue entry, April 2012, 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/houses-and-boats-at-gravesend-r1140054, accessed 31 July 2026.