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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Louis-Philippe at Portsmouth 1844 > Louis-Philippe at Portsmouth sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The 'Gomer' Arriving in Portsmouth Harbour 1844

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The 'Gomer' Arriving in Portsmouth Harbour’ 1844
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 10 Verso:
The ‘Gomer’ Arriving in Portsmouth Harbour 1844
D35702
Turner Bequest CCCLXII 10
Pencil on white wove paper, 74 x 116 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, the sketch at the bottom left shows figures and small boats; compare folio compare 8 verso (D35699). With the page turned vertically, at the outer edge is a study of the port side of a large hybrid sail-steamship, apparently the Gomer, which carried Louis-Philippe, King of the French, into Portsmouth Harbour on 8 October 1844; it was characterised by its high paddle wheel housing amidships, as Ian Warrell has noted.1
For other studies of the vessel, see under folio 1 verso (D35686). There are many other rapid drawings in this book relating to Louis-Philippe’s arrival, as discussed in the Introductions to the sketchbook and the overall section.
The blank recto is inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘10’ and stamped in black ‘CCCLXII – 10’ at the bottom right. For numerous instances of blank, unaccessioned rectos in this sketchbook, see the technical notes in the Introduction.

Matthew Imms
September 2016

1
Warrell 2013, p.10.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The ‘Gomer’ Arriving in Portsmouth Harbour 1844 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2017, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-gomer-arriving-in-portsmouth-harbour-r1185649, accessed 26 April 2024.