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 ... > Mortlake and Pulborough Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats 1825

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats’ 1825
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 5 Verso:
The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats 1825
D18715
Turner Bequest CCXIII 5a
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 187 mm
Part watermark ‘R Bar | 18’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘[?Dd]’ right of centre, ‘waterman C[...]’ top right, and ‘Blue [?Gd Inspector ...] | the Waterman [...]’ top left, ascending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
To the east down the River Thames, the upstream side of Old London Bridge is seen; the view is continued to the right halfway across folio 6 recto opposite (D18716). The main view centres on the marquee erected over the coffer-dam around the site of the southernmost pier of the new London Bridge, for the foundation stone ceremony held on the riverbed on 15 June 1825; in the foreground are indications of what appear to be small boats, with a variant detail at the top of the page. At the outer edge is a note perhaps indicating the clothing of officials involved in water-borne aspects of the ceremony.
The event and other studies relating to it at the beginning and end of this sketchbook are discussed in the Introduction.

Matthew Imms
December 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats 1825 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-the-london-bridge-foundation-stone-ceremony-the-marquee-r1172837, accessed 23 April 2024.