Bohemia Village Voice

Hastings Fishmarket on the Sands one of our local museums prize works is off on a tour of the UK in September

“Hastings: Fishmarket on the Sands, Early Morning”, the watercolour by J M W Turner is leaving Bohemia at the end of September. It is off on loan as part of a national Turner touring exhibition. It will be visiting Nottingham Castle Museum and the Ferens Art Gallery in Hull, before returning to Hastings for display in the summer of 2009. This is your last chance to see it before it disappears on its travels.
The Museum acquired the painting, "Hastings: Fish Market on the Sands, Early Morning", in 2006 when it was sold at Sotheby’s auction for £210,000.  It is the largest of ten known watercolours of Hastings by JMW Turner. The 1824 painting shows an early morning market with the Sussex town and castle in the distance. It depicts fishermen and fishwives selling produce, joined by a group of fashionable women and a boy with a hoop. It also has two figures in Greek costume, said to be a reference to the Greek War of Independence which had support in Britain at the time.
Hastings Museum already had a collection of Turner engravings, including sketches, objects and furniture from the painter’s house, but this was the museum’s first Turner watercolour. 
n Hastings Museum & Art Gallery is located in Bohemia Road just oppositie Falaise Road. Tel 0845 274 1052. Open Mon – Sat  10am to 5pm and Sundays 11am to 5pm.