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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Normandy ?1829 > Tancarville and Lillebonne Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Church of Saint-Martin, Harfleur ?1829

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Church of Saint-Martin, Harfleur’ ?1829
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 3 Recto:
Church of Saint-Martin, Harfleur ?1829
D23703
Turner Bequest CCLIII 3
Pencil on pale cream laid paper, 156 x 107 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘3’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLIII – 3’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The page contains a sketch of the Gothic Church of Saint-Martin, Harfleur, constructed between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries.1 From his viewpoint on folio 2 verso opposite (D23702), Turner has moved around the south-west corner of the church, to depict the church’s entrance on its west side, and he concentrates on elements of the tower and door.
Finberg identified the building as a ‘Gothic church at Harfleur’2 and the location of Harfleur has been confirmed.3 (For further information on Harfleur, see under folio 1 recto, D23699.) The shape of the tower and decorative details especially those around the door, correspond to those of the Saint-Martin. There is a further, smaller, and less detailed sketch at top right, of the church’s spire.
1
‘L’église Saint-Martin’, www.harfleur.fr, accessed 9 February 2017, http://www.harfleur.fr/spip.php?article18.
2
Finberg 1909, II, p.768.
3
Guillaud and others 1981, fig.660, p.326; ?Ian Warrell, ‘Turner on the Seine: Topographical Index’, c.1999, Prints and Drawings Room, Tate Britain (printout in copy of Ian Warrell, Turner on the Seine, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1999), p.3.
Technical notes:
There is a small brown discolouration in the paper towards the upper right edge.

Caroline South
May 2017

How to cite

Caroline South, ‘Church of Saint-Martin, Harfleur ?1829 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2017, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2019, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-church-of-saint-martin-harfleur-r1195609, accessed 19 May 2024.