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 Shipping Including the 'Victory' off the Portsmouth Dockyard Semaphore Tower 1844

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Shipping Including the 'Victory' off the Portsmouth Dockyard Semaphore Tower’ 1844
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 36 Recto:
Shipping Including the ‘Victory’ off the Portsmouth Dockyard Semaphore Tower 1844
D35753
Turner Bequest CCCLXII 36
Pencil on white wove paper, 74 x 116 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘36’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCCLXII – 36’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Like the other rapid sketches in this book, this relates to the arrival of Louis-Philippe, King of the French, at Portsmouth Harbour on 8 October 1844, as discussed in the Introductions to the sketchbook and the overall section. Ian Warrell has noted that the scene includes the Portsmouth Dockyard Semaphore tower, as well as HMS Victory,1 which Turner had last drawn in the 1827 Isle of Wight sketchbook (Tate D20766; Turner Bequest CCXXVII 22); he had first encountered her on her return from Trafalgar in 1805 (see ‘Marine Subjects c.1803–14’ in the present catalogue).
The 1845 painting The Arrival of the His Majesty the King of the French (Southampton City Art Gallery), by John Christian Schetky (1778–1874), shows the Victory firing a salute near the tower in the distance.2 Compare detailed studies of the building, perhaps from the summer of 1824, in the London Bridge and Portsmouth sketchbook (Tate D17941; Turner Bequest CCVI 15).

Matthew Imms
September 2016

1
See Warrell 2013, p.10.
2
See ibid., p.11 fig.3 (colour).

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Shipping Including the ‘Victory’ off the Portsmouth Dockyard Semaphore Tower 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-shipping-including-the-victory-off-the-portsmouth-dockyard-r1185687, accessed 26 April 2024.