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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Switzerland 1802 > Studies in the Louvre Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Venus at the Forge of Vulcan, after Anthony Van Dyck 1802

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Venus at the Forge of Vulcan, after Anthony Van Dyck’ 1802
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 16 Recto:
Venus at the Forge of Vulcan, after Anthony Van Dyck 1802
D04291
Turner Bequest LXXII 16
Pencil, with some scratching out, on white wove paper prepared with a grey wash, 128 x 114 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘16’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘LXXII–16’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Van Dyck’s (Sir Anthony Van Dyck 1599–1641) picture, painted 1630–2, was acquired by Louis XIV between 1684 and 1713. The subject is from Virgil’s Aeneid. Venus, using her amorous wiles, persuades her husband Vulcan to forge arms to protect her son Aeneas in a forthcoming battle. The figure of Vulcan is not apparent in Turner’s copy. Turner admired Van Dyck’s rich colouring and expressive handling, and also made notes on his portrait Cardinal Guido Bentivoglio (Palazzo Pitti, Florence), which was then in the Louvre; see folio 33 of this sketchbook (D04316).
Verso:
Blank

David Blayney Brown
July 2005

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Venus at the Forge of Vulcan, after Anthony Van Dyck 1802 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, July 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-venus-at-the-forge-of-vulcan-after-anthony-van-dyck-r1129699, accessed 21 November 2024.