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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Venice, Austria and Southern Germany ... > Rotterdam to Venice Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Piazzetta, Venice, with the Palazzo Ducale (Doge's Palace), Columns and Libreria Sansoviniana, and San Giorgio Maggiore across the Bacino 1840

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Piazzetta, Venice, with the Palazzo Ducale (Doge's Palace), Columns and Libreria Sansoviniana, and San Giorgio Maggiore across the Bacino’ 1840
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 79 Verso:
The Piazzetta, Venice, with the Palazzo Ducale (Doge’s Palace), Columns and Libreria Sansoviniana, and San Giorgio Maggiore across the Bacino 1840
D32418
Turner Bequest CCCXX 79a
Pencil on white wove paper, 89 x 149 mm
Partial watermark ‘J H’
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Along with folio 77 verso (D32414), folios 79 verso–82 verso (D32418–D32424) show various aspects of the Piazzetta, all made with the pages turned horizontally. Here, the view is south-south-east, flanked by the Palazzo Ducale (Doge’s Palace) on the left and the Libreria Sansoviniana on the right, with the two columns on the Molo waterfront framing the view across the Bacino to the campanile and dome of San Giorgio Maggiore on the island of the same name.
Compare a more detailed pencil study in the 1819 Milan to Venice sketchbook (D14402; Turner Bequest CLXXV 46a) from a similar viewpoint (albeit omitting the library), again showing the church between the columns, which are of similar heights but rendered unequal in both drawings by the oblique perspective.
The view on folio 80 recto opposite (D32419) is from a similar position, but focusses of the right-hand half of the scene. See also the disjointed panorama in the opposite direction, towards the Piazza (St Mark’s Square), on folios 80 verso–81 recto (D32420–D32421).

Matthew Imms
September 2018

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The Piazzetta, Venice, with the Palazzo Ducale (Doge’s Palace), Columns and Libreria Sansoviniana, and San Giorgio Maggiore across the Bacino 1840 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2018, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2019, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-piazzetta-venice-with-the-palazzo-ducale-doges-palace-r1196652, accessed 24 September 2024.