When Joseph Mallord William Turner prepared his Sketch for Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus in 1827, he was already at the height of his fame, and the finished painting would soon dazzle audiences at the Royal Academy. What makes this sketch remarkable is that it offers a rare glimpse into Turner’s process—his explosive energy and rapid improvisation—before the final, celebrated canvas took shape. Few preparatory works survive for Turner’s mythological scenes, making this an unusually direct window onto his working mind at a moment of creative ferment. The drama here springs from Homer’s Odyssey: Ulysses (Odysseus) and his men have just escaped the cave of the giant Polyphemus, blinding the monster and now sailing away in triumph.

Turner chooses the instant Ulysses taunts the blinded Cyclops from his ship, a moment thick with both danger and bravado. In the sketch, the ship surges forward under a billowing, almost abstract sky, while a shadowy form—Polyphemus—looms on the cliffs. The light rakes across the water, guiding the eye to the tiny, defiant figure of Ulysses, arm raised in mockery.

Unlike Nicolas Poussin’s more stately Landscape with Polyphemus, Turner’s vision is all turbulence and motion, emphasizing the peril and pride of the Greek hero. The precise medium of this sketch remains uncertain, but its loose, gestural marks suggest oil or watercolor rapidly applied, in keeping with Turner’s experimental methods of the late 1820s. The finished painting, commissioned by the collector Walter Fawkes, would become one of Turner’s most admired mythological works. This sketch, however, was likely kept in the artist’s studio, a private tool rather than a public display.

Today, it stands as a testament to Turner’s restless invention and his fascination with the intersection of myth and nature, bridging the gap between the artist’s hand and the legend that inspired him.