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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Second Italian Tour 1828-9 > Marseilles to Genoa Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Two Distant Views of Nice, from the Sea 1828

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Two Distant Views of Nice, from the Sea’ 1828
Folio 6 Verso:
Two Distant Views of Nice, from the Sea 1828
D21144
Turner Bequest CCXXXI 6a
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 174 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘Pink’ top right, ‘1’ top left, and ‘2’ within sketch, bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner travelled to Nice by boat, and these two sketches, with the page turned horizontally, document his approach from the sea, looking north towards the city. At the top is a distant view of the coastline with Nice visible centre right of the composition, encircled by the hills and mountains of the Alpes-maritimes.1 Turner’s inscription ‘Pink’ in the sky above suggests that his arrival occurred at day’s end. The second sketch below is taken from a closer viewpoint with Nice and the hill known as the ‘Château’ on the left, and the peninsula of Cap Ferrat on the far right.2
Similar sketches can be found on folio 7 recto and verso (D21145–D21146).

Nicola Moorby
March 2017

Revised by Hannah Kaspar
November 2024

1
See Guillaud, Alfrey, Wilton and others 1981, p.285; see also Roland Courtot, ‘Les Carnets de William Turner: Recherches d’identification et de localisation des dessins’, unpublished research notes, Université de Provence à Aix, April 2008, p.3, as ‘Nice’ (shared with former Tate cataloguer Nicola Moorby in email correspondence at that date).
2
Ibid.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Two Distant Views of Nice, from the Sea 1828’, catalogue entry, March 2017, revised by Hannah Kaspar, November 2024, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, February 2025, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/two-distant-views-of-nice-from-the-sea-r1209822, accessed 15 April 2025.