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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Northern Germany, the Elbe and Prague ... > Prague, Nuremberg, Frankfurt and Rhine ... > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Prague: Hradcany and St Nicholas's Church from the South-West 1835

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Prague: Hradcany and St Nicholas's Church from the South-West’ 1835
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 79 Recto:
Prague: Hradcany and St Nicholas's Church from the South-West 1835
D30781
Turner Bequest CCCIV 79
Pencil on cream laid paper, 118 x 190 mm
Watermark ‘[z]onen’
Inscribed in red ink by Ruskin ‘79’ bottom right, reinscribed ‘79’ in black ink at a later date and possibly by another hand
Stamped in black ‘CCCIV–79’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This detailed study of Prague was taken from a high vantage point on Petrín Hill, looking towards the Hradcany, the imperial Castle and Cathedral of St Vitus. St Nicholas’ Church has also been carefully rendered in the foreground, with the spire of St Thomas’ Church adjacent. Prague Castle was the residence of the kings of Bohemia and Holy Roman Emperors, and St Vitus their official place of worship.
Turner produced several views of Prague on the 1835 tour. For other drawings in this sketchbook Tate D30759–30761, D30764–D30765, D30767, D30771–D30773, D30775–D30777, D30779–D30783, D30788–D30790, D30792–D30803, D30805, D30807–D30811, D30813–D30820; Turner Bequest CCCIV 68–69, 70a–71, 72, 74–75, 76–77, 78–80, 82a–84, 85–91, 92, 93–96, 97–102. See also the Dresden, Tepliz and Prague sketchbook (Tate D30344–D30361, D30364–D30366; Turner Bequest CCCI 25–33a, 36–37).

Alice Rylance-Watson
December 2015

How to cite

Alice Rylance-Watson, ‘Prague: Hradcany and St Nicholas's Church from the South-West 1835 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, December 2015, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, August 2017, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-prague-hradcany-and-st-nicholass-church-from-the-south-west-r1187156, accessed 22 November 2024.