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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Château de Versailles, Île-de-France 1832

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 18 Verso:
Château de Versailles, Île-de-France 1832
D24202
Turner Bequest CCLVII 18a
Pencil on white laid paper, 175 x 127 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘3 3 3’ towards top right, ‘Ap L’ ‘Ap’ ‘Am[...]’ ‘F[...]’ centre
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
With the sketchbook turned horizontally, Turner filled much of this page with a view of the gardens and palace at Versailles, located some twelve miles south-west of central Paris. The monumental western façade of the building is featured on the right-hand side of the page, before which can be seen the statues surround the ponds of the Parterre d’Eau. Turner made numerous sketches of the palace in the present volume, a list of which is provided in the sketchbook Introduction. The existence of so many studies suggests that Turner considered Versailles as a subject for an illustration for a new edition of Walter Scott’s Life of Napoleon Buonaparte (1834–36) although it was not included in the publication in the event.1

John Chu
January 2015

1
W[illiam] G[eorge] Rawlinson, The Engraved Work of J.M.W. Turner, R.A., London 1908, vol.II, pp.264–76 nos.453–92, 288–92 nos.525–39.

How to cite

John Chu, ‘Château de Versailles, Île-de-France 1832 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, January 2015, 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-chateau-de-versailles-le-de-france-r1175230, accessed 28 March 2024.