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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Two Views of the River Saône between Chalon-sur-Saône and Tournus 1819

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 20 Recto:
Two Views of the River Saône between Chalon-sur-Saône and Tournus 1819
D14022
Turner Bequest CLXXIII 20
Pencil on white wove paper, 114 x 185 mm
Stamped in black ‘CLXXIII 20’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The visual evidence of Turner’s sketches after Chalon-sur-Saône suggest that he may have continued his onward journey to Lyon by river instead of road. According to contemporary guidebooks the road diligence (a large public carriage) from Paris connected at Chalon with a packet boat service or water diligence, called a Coch d’eau and this made a pleasanter journey to Lyon than by land.1 Indeed the countryside on the right bank of the river between Chalon and Mâcon was described as amongst ‘the richest and most beautiful in France.’2
The two sketches on this page appear to depict landscapes seen from the river. The exact locations are currently unidentified although the upper vista may represent a distant view of Tournus.
1
See for example, Heinrich August O. Reichard, A Descriptive Road Book of France, London 1829, pp.101–2, and Mariana Starke, Travels on the Continent between the Years 1824 and 1828 Written for the Use and Particular Information of Travellers, London 1828, p.458.
2
Reichard 1829, p.103.
Verso:
Blank

Nicola Moorby
February 2013

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Two Views of the River Saône between Chalon-sur-Saône and Tournus 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, August 2013, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-two-views-of-the-river-saone-between-chalon-sur-saone-and-r1142882, accessed 28 March 2024.