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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Erotica and Improvisations c.1834-6 > Colour Studies (2) Sketchbook [Finberg ... > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner ?A Curtained Bed, with a Naked Couple Embracing c.1834-6

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘?A Curtained Bed, with a Naked Couple Embracing’ c.1834-6
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 15 Verso:
?A Curtained Bed, with a Naked Couple Embracing c.1834–6
D28892
Turner Bequest CCXCI c 15
Watercolour and pencil on white wove paper, 79 x 101 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, the couple reaching out to embrace each other (within what may be a shadowy curtained bed) were first defined in a flurry of wash strokes, with occasional touches of pencil to articulate aspects of their outlines, including apparently the man’s genitals; compare folio 6 recto (D28879).
For a discussion of the improvisatory and often erotic nature of the watercolour studies making up most of this sketchbook, see the Introduction.
The unaccessioned, blank recto is numbered in red ink ‘15’ and stamped ‘CCXCI(c) – 15’.

Matthew Imms
May 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘?A Curtained Bed, with a Naked Couple Embracing c.1834–6 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2014, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, September 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-a-curtained-bed-with-a-naked-couple-embracing-r1148990, accessed 23 April 2024.