Joseph Mallord William Turner The Zen Chapel in the Basilica of San Marco (St Mark's), Venice 1840
Joseph Mallord William Turner,
The Zen Chapel in the Basilica of San Marco (St Mark's), Venice
1840
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
The Zen Chapel in the Basilica of San Marco (St Mark’s), Venice 1840
D32227
Turner Bequest CCCXVIII 8
Turner Bequest CCCXVIII 8
Gouache, ink wash and watercolour on red-brown wove paper, 314 x 243 mm
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram towards bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCCXVIII – 8’ bottom right
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram towards bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCCXVIII – 8’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Exhibition history
1937
Aquarelles de Turner, oeuvres de Blake/Englischen Graphiken und Aquarellen: W. Blake und J.M.W. Turner, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, January–February 1937, Staatliche Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna, March–April 1937 (109, as ‘Venedig, Inneres einer Kirche’, c.1839).
1951
Aquarelle aus dem Turner-Nachlass im Britischen Museum veranstaltet vom British Council, Düsseldorf, Wiesbaden, Mannheim, Munich, Nuremberg: September or October 1950–March 1951, and September 1951–April 1952 (25, as ‘Venedig, Innenansicht einer Kirche (San Marco?)’, 1839–40).
1959
[Display of watercolours from the Turner Bequest], Tate Gallery, London, June/July 1959–January 1965 (no catalogue).
1961
J.W.M. [sic] Turner 1775–1851: Watercolours: On Loan to the National Gallery of Victoria on the Occasion of its Centenary from the Turner Bequest by Courtesy of the Trustees and Director of the British Museum, London, with the Assistance of the British Council, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, September–October 1961, National Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, October–November 1961 (29, as ‘Venice: Interior of a Church (St. Mark’s?)’, 1839–40, reproduced).
1965
[Display of watercolours from the Turner Bequest], Tate Gallery, London, ? – [?]March 1965 (no catalogue).
1972
Director’s Study, British Museum, London, September 1972 (no catalogue).
1993
J.M.W. Turner 1775–1851: Impressions de Gran Bretanya i el Continent Europeu / Impresiones de Gran Bretaña y el Continente Europeo, Centre Cultural de la Fundació ”la Caixa”, Barcelona, September–November 1993, Sala de Exposiciones de la Fundación ”la Caixa”, Madrid, November 1993–January 1994 (69, as ‘Venice: The Interior of St. Mark’s’, c.1833–5, reproduced in colour).
1994
J.M.W. Turner 1775–1851: Aquarelles et Dessins du Legs Turner: Collection de la Tate Gallery, Londres / Watercolours and Drawings from the Turner Bequest: Collection from the Tate Gallery, London, Palais des Beaux-Arts de Charleroi, September–December 1994 (69, as ‘Venice: The Interior of St. Mark’s’, c.1833–5, reproduced in colour).
References
1909
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.II, p.1027, CCCXVIII 8, as ‘Interior of church. (? St. Mark’s.) [On back,] – “10.”’.
1930
A.J. Finberg, In Venice with Turner, London 1930, p.176, as ‘Interior of a Church’, probably 1835.
1839
Laurence Binyon, Ausstellung von englischen Graphiken und Aquarellen: W. Blake und J.M.W. Turner, exhibition catalogue, Staatliche Graphische Sammlung Albertina, Vienna 1937, p.28 no.109, as ‘Venedig, Inneres einer Kirche’, c.1839.
1950
J. Isaacs, Aquarelle aus dem Turner-Nachlass im Britischen Museum veranstaltet vom British Council, exhibition British Council German tour, 1950, p.14 no.25, as ‘Venedig, Innenansicht einer Kirche (San Marco?)’, 1839–40.
1961
J. Isaacs, J.W.M. [sic] Turner 1775–1851: Watercolours: On Loan to the National Gallery of Victoria on the Occasion of its Centenary from the Turner Bequest by Courtesy of the Trustees and Director of the British Museum, London, with the Assistance of the British Council, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne 1961, reproduced p.23, p.32 no.29, as ‘Venice: Interior of a Church (St. Mark’s?)’, 1839–40.
1833
Lindsay Stainton, Turner’s Venice, London 1985, p.46 no.15, as ‘The interior of St Mark’s’, ?1833, pl.15 (colour).
1833
Ian Warrell, J.M.W. Turner 1775–1851: Impressions de Gran Bretanya i el Continent Europeu / Impresiones de Gran Bretaña y el Continente Europeo, exhibition catalogue, Centre Cultural de la Fundació ”la Caixa”, Barcelona 1993, p.210, reproduced in colour p.211, p.306 no.69, as ‘Venice: The Interior of St. Mark’s’, c.1833–5.
1833
Ian Warrell, J.M.W. Turner 1775–1851: Aquarelles et Dessins du Legs Turner: Collection de la Tate Gallery, Londres / Watercolours and Drawings from the Turner Bequest: Collection from the Tate Gallery, London, exhibition catalogue, Palais des Beaux-Arts de Charleroi 1994, p.212 no.69, as ‘Venice: The Interior of St. Mark’s’, c.1833–5, reproduced in colour p.[213].
1997
Inge Herold, Turner on Tour, Munich and New York 1997, reproduced in colour p.83, as ‘In San Marco’, 1833.
2003
Ian Warrell in Warrell, David Laven, Jan Morris and others, Turner and Venice, exhibition catalogue, Tate Britain, London 2003, pp.125, 259.
The Turner scholar C.F. Bell annotated Finberg’s 1909 Inventory entry (‘Interior of church. (?St. Mark’s.)’): ‘Rather fantastic. Mass being said at one of the side altars in the transept. But the Zen tomb appears in the middle!’.1 While the actions of the loosely indicated figures are open to less specific interpretations, Bell’s identification of the tomb seems correct, and has been accepted by Ian Warrell, noting the setting as ‘the funerary chapel dedicated to Cardinal Giambattista Zen [died 1501], nephew of Pope Paul II’.2
The view is southwards into the small but richly decorated chapel, at the south-west corner of the basilica of San Marco. There is a sense of the baldacchino or ciborium canopy with a pediment projecting over the altar on the far wall, with vague indications of its reredos comprising the seated bronze Madonna della Scarpa flanked by Saints Peter and John the Baptist, below a large arched window without tracery. The effigy of the cardinal (like the Madonna, by Antonio Lombardo, c.1458–1516)3 lies feet first towards the altar, wearing a mitre and with his head supported by pillows at the near end. There are three bronze caryatid figures down each long side, which seem to catch the light.
Although no pencil study is known, these details appear relatively accurate and more closely recalled than the features in Turner’s contemporary colour study of the imposing spaces of the nave and transept (Tate D32226; Turner Bequest CCCXVIII 7); in relation to both, Lindsay Stainton has called it ‘characteristic’ of Turner ‘to ignore ... the architectural detail and to concentrate on the shafts of light penetrating the mysterious darkness of the church’.4 See also Tate D32241 and D32252 (Turner Bequest CCCXVIII 22, CCCXIX 4).
Technical notes:
This is one of numerous 1840 Venice works Ian Warrell has noted as being on ‘Red-brown paper made at Cartieri Pietro Milani Mill, Fabriano, with a watermark showing the letter “M” accompanied by laurel leaves:1 Tate D32224, D32227, D32230, D32238–D32241, D32245–D32246, D32248, D32251, D32254 (Turner Bequest CCCXVIII 5, 8, 11, 19–22, 26, 27, 29, CCCXIX 3, 6). As Warrell has observed; the support ‘seems to be quite absorbent, so that the colours penetrate through to the back of the sheet’.2
‘Appendix: The papers used for Turner’s Venetian Watercolours’ (1840, section 9) in Warrell 2003, p.259; see also see also Peter Bower, Turner’s Later Papers: A Study of the Manufacture, Selection and Use of his Drawing Papers 1820–1851, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1999, p.111 under no.64; and Warrell 2003, p.259, sections 10 and 11, for other likely Italian (possibly Fabriano) brown papers.
Verso:
Blank; inscribed by Turner in ink ‘10’ top right, descending vertically; inscribed in pencil ‘41’ centre. For Turner’s ink numbering of many similar sheets, see the Introduction to the tour.
Matthew Imms
September 2018
How to cite
Matthew Imms, ‘The Zen Chapel in the Basilica of San Marco (St Mark’s), Venice 1840 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2018, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2019, https://www