J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Thames sketchbooks c.1804-14 > Hesperides (2) Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Abingdon Bridge, with St Helen's Church to the Right 1805

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Abingdon Bridge, with St Helen's Church to the Right’ 1805
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 40 Verso:
Abingdon Bridge, with St Helen’s Church to the Right 1805
D05899
Turner Bequest XCIV 40a
Pencil on white wove paper, prepared with a grey wash, 143 x 228 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
See folio 4 verso of the sketchbook (D05850) for a slightly more developed sketch of the same view of the Thames, which here splits into two channels, with Abingdon Bridge, the adjacent Nag’s Head Inn and, beyond the bridge in the right distance, the spire of St Helen’s Church. Another slight sketch of the bridge is on folio 41 (D05900) and is effectively a continuation of the present subject towards the right. Butlin and Joll relate the present sketch to the painting Abingdon (Tate N00485), probably shown in Turner’s Gallery in 1806 or 1807, while observing that the relationship is ‘less close’ than with 4 verso which Turner used for the picture.1

David Blayney Brown
December 2007

1
Butlin and Joll 1984, p.77 no.107 (pl.114), as ‘Dorchester Mead, Oxfordshire’, exhibited in Turner’s Gallery, 1810

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Abingdon Bridge, with St Helen’s Church to the Right 1805 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, December 2007, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-abingdon-bridge-with-st-helens-church-to-the-right-r1130122, accessed 25 April 2024.