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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Ponte della Veneta Marina, Venice; the Eastern Harbour Lighthouse on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore across the Canale di San Marco 1833

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 11 Verso:
The Ponte della Veneta Marina, Venice; the Eastern Harbour Lighthouse on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore across the Canale di San Marco 1833
D31947
Turner Bequest CCCXIV 11a
Pencil on white laid paper, 109 x 203 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
There are two distinct sketches here, both made with the page turned horizontally. They further extend the range of a two-part panoramic view westwards over the Canale di San Marco towards Santa Maria della Salute from near the Ponte Veneta Marina, show on the left here beside waterfront buildings along what is now the start of the Riva dei Sette Martiri; these details are continued from folio 10 verso (D31945), where the bridge is seen on the right with the campanile of San Marco (St Mark’s) in the distance.
On the right here is the north-eastern point of the Isola di San Giorgio Maggiore, seen to the south-west, with one of the two lighthouses marking its harbour and low buildings east of the island’s eponymous church; the latter is seen at the left-hand edge on the recto (D31946), where the other lighthouse is shown. There is a faint reprise of the part of the island shown here on folio 12 recto opposite (D31948), which turns
The present sketch falls within what was perhaps a single waterborne excursion (folios 10 verso–24 recto; D31945–D31972) out towards the Giardini Pubblici at the eastern end of Venice and then westwards across the Lagoon along the southern shores of the islands of San Giorgio Maggiore and the Giudecca, before turning back for the Bacino at the heart of the city along the Canale della Giudecca. For this sketchbook’s general sequence, including Hardy George’s broad overview,1 see its Introduction.

Matthew Imms
May 2019

1
See George 1984, pp.13–15.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The Ponte della Veneta Marina, Venice; the Eastern Harbour Lighthouse on the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore across the Canale di San Marco 1833 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2019, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2023, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-ponte-della-veneta-marina-venice-the-eastern-harbour-r1203625, accessed 24 November 2024.