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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > The Second Meuse-Moselle Tour 1839 > Givet, Mézières, Verdun, Metz, Luxemburg ... > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Distant View of Metz with a Bridge over the Moselle, the Towers of St Vincent's Church, and the Cathedral of Saint-Etienne 1839

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Distant View of Metz with a Bridge over the Moselle, the Towers of St Vincent's Church, and the Cathedral of Saint-Etienne’ 1839
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 25 Verso:
Distant View of Metz with a Bridge over the Moselle, the Towers of St Vincent’s Church, and the Cathedral of Saint-Etienne 1839
D28216
Turner Bequest CCLXXXVIII 25 a
Pencil on cream laid writing paper, 101 x 168 mm
Partial Pro Patria watermark
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘6’ centre towards left | ‘Fete of [...]’ bottom towards right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Rendered roughly with swift and free line, these are two panoramic sketches views of Metz from a distance. The prospects encompass the towers of St Vincent’s church and the Cathedral of Saint-Étienne. Underneath the bridge, roughly suggested at the left of the larger of the two sketches, Turner has inscribed the number ‘6’, and towards the right: the word ‘fete’ (i.e. fête, French for a celebration or festival).
For other representations of Metz in this sketchbook see Tate D28200, D28217–D28219, D28221, D28222, D28232–D28235; Turner Bequest CCLXXXVIII 17a, 26–27, 28, 28a, 34–36. There is also a gouache and watercolour drawing of the city produced on blue paper in 1839 (Tate D24757; Turner Bequest CCLIX 192). For earlier depictions of Metz see the Rivers Meuse and Moselle sketchbook of 1824 (Tate D19706, D19709, D19786; Turner Bequest CCXVI 79, 80a, 118).

Alice Rylance-Watson
May 2013

How to cite

Alice Rylance-Watson, ‘Distant View of Metz with a Bridge over the Moselle, the Towers of St Vincent’s Church, and the Cathedral of Saint-Etienne 1839 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-distant-view-of-metz-with-a-bridge-over-the-moselle-the-r1150493, accessed 25 April 2024.