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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Thames, London and South of England 1821 ... > Mortlake and Pulborough Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats 1825

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats’ 1825
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 6 Verso:
The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats 1825
D18717
Turner Bequest CCXIII 6a
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 187 mm
Part watermark ‘R Bar | 18’
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
To the left, looking east down the River Thames, is the marquee erected over the coffer-dam around the site of the southernmost pier of the new London Bridge, for the foundation stone ceremony held on the riverbed on 15 June 1825, with its large flags flying. On the right-hand side the subject is less clear, with a jumble of boats and figures surrounding a structure or objects which are not readily legible.

The ceremony and other studies relating to it at the beginning and end of this sketchbook are discussed in the Introduction.

Matthew Imms
December 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The London Bridge Foundation Stone Ceremony: The Marquee beside Old London Bridge, with Boats 1825 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, December 2014, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, April 2015, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-london-bridge-foundation-stone-ceremony-the-marquee-r1172839, accessed 24 November 2024.