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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Switzerland 1802 > Rhine, Strassburg and Oxford Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Town on a River 1802-3

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Town on a River’ 1802-3
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 37 Recto:
Town on a River 1802–3
D04779
Turner Bequest LXXVII 37
Pencil on white wove paper, 154 x 240 mm
Inscribed probably by John Ruskin in red ink ‘37’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘LXXVII – 37’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This view and that on folio 47 verso of this sketchbook (D04793) appear to show the same subject, a town or village with a church or similar tower in a broad river valley. It is probably in the Thames valley and might be Sunningwell, the home of Turner’s uncle (see Introduction), although the form of the tower seems somewhat different from the church there.
Verso:
Blank, but with splashes of yellow, blue and reddish-brown watercolour. Inscribed probably by John Ruskin in red ink ‘828’ top right

David Blayney Brown
March 2004

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Town on a River 1802–3 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2004, 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-town-on-a-river-r1133483, accessed 25 April 2024.