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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Marine subjects c.1803-14 > Shipwreck (1) Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Study for 'The Shipwreck': A Sinking Ship and a Boat in Rough Seas c.1805

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Study for 'The Shipwreck': A Sinking Ship and a Boat in Rough Seas’ c.1805
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 9 Recto:
Study for ‘The Shipwreck’: A Sinking Ship and a Boat in Rough Seas circa 1805
D05386
Turner Bequest LXXXVII 11
Pen and ink and brownish-grey wash on cream laid paper, 118 x 185 mm
Stamped in black ‘LXXXVII 11’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The foreground with a deep wave trough and small sailing boat anticipates Turner’s picture The Shipwreck (Tate N00476),1 but the wrecked ship in the background is positioned differently. See Introduction to the sketchbook for the picture. The drawing is badly faded from long exposure in the First Loan Collection, where it was shown together with the present folio 14 (D05384; Turner Bequest LXXXVII 9) as ‘Two sketches of Wrecks’.

David Blayney Brown
December 2005

1
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, p.43 no.54 (pl. 64).

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Study for ‘The Shipwreck’: A Sinking Ship and a Boat in Rough Seas c.1805 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, December 2005, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-study-for-the-shipwreck-a-sinking-ship-and-a-boat-in-rough-r1139168, accessed 25 November 2024.