'St Michael's Mount: The Northern Range of the Castle', Joseph Mallord William Turner

Artwork details

Artist

Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775‑1851)

Title

St Michael's Mount: The Northern Range of the Castle

From Ivy Bridge to Penzance Sketchbook

Turner Bequest CXXV

Date 1811

MediumGraphite on paper

Dimensionssupport: 166 x 208 mm

Collection

Tate

Acquisition Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

Reference

D08915

Turner Bequest CXXV 34

View this artwork by appointment, at Tate Britain's Prints and Drawings Rooms

Turner's sketchbooks

View this artwork in the Ivy Bridge to Penzance Sketchbook

Catalogue entry

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851

Folio 35 Recto:

St Michael’s Mount: The Northern Range of the Castle 1811

D08915
Turner Bequest CXXV 34

Pencil on white wove paper, 166 x 208 mm
Watermark ‘Fellows | 1808’
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram bottom left
Stamped in black ‘CXXV – 34’ top left, upside down

Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

References

Turner’s viewpoint is high on the slopes of the mount itself, with the square central church tower seen in steep perspective from the north-east. Lower down on the right is a watchtower near the batteries on the west side of the island.1 The lower levels on this side have since been extensively altered, with the addition of balustraded terraces to the left and extra rooms in place of the jagged outcrop to the right of centre, which Turner has recorded with especially vigorous pencil work.

The composition continues a little way onto folio 34 verso opposite (D40817; verso of CXXV 33). The watchtower is seen from the opposite direction on folio 36 recto (D08917; CXXV 35). For other views of the site, see under folio 32 recto (D08910; CXXV 31).

Matthew Imms
February 2011

See Jonathan Holmes, Mount’s Bay, Archive Photographs Series, Chalford 1996, p.98 (engraving, 1786).

Read this catalogue entry in full

This catalogue entry is part of: David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, December 2012.