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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Colour Studies of the Sun, Skies and ... > Colour Studies of Clear or Hazy Skies > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner ?A Sky with Light Cloud c.1828-40

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘?A Sky with Light Cloud’ c.1828-40
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
?A Sky with Light Cloud c.1828–40
D25273
Turner Bequest CCLXIII 151
Watercolour on white wove paper, 306 x 490 mm
Watermark ‘C Ansell | 1828’
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram below centre
Inscribed in red ink ‘151’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIII – 151’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Finberg interpreted the subject as ‘Clouds’,1 but the pale brown washes, whether deliberately manipulated or more or less fortuitous, are difficult to read as particular forms. The state of the sheet as noted below would render more definite comment as to Turner’s intentions largely speculative, and Eric Shanes has categorised the sheet as simply comprising undeveloped preliminary washes.2
1
Finberg 1909, II, p.826.
2
See Shanes 1997, p.103.
Technical notes:
The sheet is somewhat wrinkled and stained, probably as a result of the 1928 Tate Gallery flood.
Verso:
Blank; inscribed by John Ruskin in pencil ‘AB 150 P | O’ bottom right; stamped in black with Turner Bequest monogram bottom right; inscribed in pencil ‘CCLXIII | 151’ bottom right. There is scattered brown staining.

Matthew Imms
March 2016

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘?A Sky with Light Cloud c.1828–40 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-a-sky-with-light-cloud-r1183192, accessed 05 July 2024.