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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Thames, London and South of England 1821 ... > London Bridge and Portsmouth Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner City Barges in the Lord Mayor's Day Pageant on the River Thames Approaching ?Westminster Bridge 1824

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘City Barges in the Lord Mayor's Day Pageant on the River Thames Approaching ?Westminster Bridge’ 1824
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 31 Recto:
City Barges in the Lord Mayor’s Day Pageant on the River Thames Approaching ?Westminster Bridge 1824
D17972
Turner Bequest CCVI 31
Pencil on white wove paper, 100 x 160 mm
Part watermark ‘ells | 21’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘[?Westm Br]’ top centre
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘31’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCVI – 31’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The drawings between folios 20 verso and 34 verso (D40967, D17979) include rapid studies and notes of barges, flags, costumes and bridges along the River Thames, and appear to record or relate to the Lord Mayor’s Day procession of 9 November 1824, as discussed in the sketchbook’s Introduction. Here a large City barge is approaching what appears from Turner’s inscription to be Westminster Bridge as the waterborne pageant approaches the Palace of Westminster (see folio 33 recto in particular; D17976).

Matthew Imms
December 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘City Barges in the Lord Mayor’s Day Pageant on the River Thames Approaching ?Westminster Bridge 1824 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, December 2014, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, April 2015, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-city-barges-in-the-lord-mayors-day-pageant-on-the-river-r1172690, accessed 23 April 2024.