Tours, Looking Backwards

Tours, Looking Backwards

J. M. W. Turner, between 1826 and 1830

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Artist: J. M. W. Turner (British, 1775–1851)
Medium: Watercolor, gouache, graphite, and pen and brown ink on medium, slightly textured, blue wove paper
Size: Sheet: 4 7/8 x 7 3/8 inches (12.4 x 18.7 cm)
Museum: Yale Center for British Art
Rights: CC0 — no rights reserved

From the late 1820s Turner was involved in a project to illustrate the Great Rivers of Europe. By 1834 the publisher had gone bust, but Turner was reluctant to waste the drawings he had already created, including this view of Tours made on a tour of France in 1826. He therefore sold them to another publisher who reproduced them as The Rivers of France in 1837.

In this case the blue tint to the paper stands in for the river and the sky, allowing Turner to add highlights and shade only, a time-saving method he had begun to use from around 1815. Although Turner has depicted the river and the cathedral beyond, Tours displays a characteristically Turnerian fascination with human life rather than the obviously beautiful view, giving prominence to the people whose livelihood depends on the river.

Text: Yale Center for British Art.

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