Provenance

John Mountjoy Smith

British, 1805 - 1869

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Butter-yellow clouds and water, a periwinkle-blue sky, and pale plum-purple buildings blend in hazy, indistinct bands across this horizontal landscape painting. The paint is thickly applied in some areas, especially along the top of the sky, and the scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes throughout. The blurry horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition and the small, round, white sun shines low in the sky to our left. The sky or clouds around the sun are painted with shades of pale sapphire-blue with touches of lavender, which give way to a lemon-yellow clouds or haze in the right two-thirds of the sky. Buildings along the horizon, deep in the distance across the right three-quarters of the canvas, are loosely painted with vertical swipes of heather pink and cream white. The water, closest to us, reflects the yellow of the sky with additional touches of celery green. Brown boats spaced along the harbor carry people and objects away from us, toward the town.
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Approach to Venice, 1844, oil on canvas, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, 1937.1.110

Approach to Venice

Joseph Mallord William Turner · 1844 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1937.1.110

Bibliography

2013

  • Sebag-Montefiore, Charles, with Julia I. Armstrong-Totten. A Dynasty of Dealers: John Smith and Successors 1801-1924. The Roxburghe Club, London, 2013.