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

This sheet is one of a series of sketches associated with a tour of the Seine with a proposed dating of 1827–9. The studies are characterised by the use of pen and ink on blue paper; for more information see the Introduction to this section.

While the Turner Bequest’s first cataloguer, A.J. Finberg, identified this sheet as a view on the Seine, the art historians Nicholas Alfrey and Ian Warrell recognised it as a view of St-German-en-Laye from Marly.1 The study is one of a small group catalogued within this section to have been made in a panoramic format, with each sheet measuring around 9.5 by 28 cm. For the others see Tate D24894–D24896, D24899–D24900, D24904–D24905 (Turner Bequest CCLX 58–60, 63–4, 68–69). As Warrell has noted, while the popularity of the panoramic format during Turner’s day may at first glance make this appear unsurprising, it was format Turner rarely used; other exceptions include some of Turner’s depictions of Petworth.2 Turner owned a copy of Thomas Girtin’s Twenty Views of Paris, and it seems very possible that the panoramic format Seine studies took some heed of them.3 For more information, see the Introduction to this section.

For other views of St-Germain-en-Laye believed to date from the same visit, see Tate D24895, D24896 and D24904 (Turner Bequest CCLX 59, 60, 68).

Verso:

Warrell records the verso of this sheet as inscribed ‘St Germain from Marly’, and, by Ruskin ‘72’1; the sheet has since been laid down on heavy paper and the verso could not be examined at the time of cataloguing.