Lot 2: Daniel Turner (British, exh. 1782-1801)

A view down the Thames looking towards St. Paul's Cathedral, with Somerset House dominating the northern shoreline,
signed and dated 'No.1805', oil on panel,
17 1/4 x 28 5/8in. (43.8 x 72.7cm.)

Situated on the Strand, on the site of the first Renaissance palace in England, the complex known as Somerset House was designed by Sir William Chambers, the Surveyor General, in 1775 as a grand suite of government offices, the like of which neither London nor any parliamentary administration had ever seen before. The grandiose scheme was still unfinished when Chambers died in 1796 but Turner shows it, with the water gate below the terrace, after the completion of the initial phases. Whereas Somerset House still dominates the Thames shoreline however, the great dome of St. Paul's, which towered over the city until at least 1900, is far less conspicuous now that modern developments have so brutally changed the London skyline.