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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Scotland 1831 > Abbotsford Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Innerwick Castle, East Lothian 1831

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Innerwick Castle, East Lothian’ 1831
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 10 Verso:
Innerwick Castle, East Lothian 1831
D25945
Turner Bequest CCLXVII 10a
Pencil on off-white wove writing paper, 113 x 185 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘26 12 6 [...] [...]’ top inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
A similar sketch to the one on this page, which was drawn with the book inverted, has been identified by Gerald Finley as Innerwick Castle (folio 28 verso; D25977; CCLXVII 28a).1 Here the ruins are seen from the north with Thornton Burn flowing beneath them to the left. There is another similar view on folio 58 verso (D26029; CCLXVII 60a). See folio 28 verso for more information on Turner’s visit to the site.
The inscription at the top of the page, when the sketchbook is in its usual orientation, has not been deciphered beyond Finberg’s suggestion: ‘26 12 6 Colnaghi’s Feb 5’. This reading, however, is doubtful and its meaning has not been explained. The fact that it was written with the book held in the opposite direction to the sketch suggests that was written at another time and is unconnected.

Thomas Ardill
September 2009

1
Gerald E. Finley, ‘J.M.W. Turner and Sir Walter Scott: Iconography of a Tour’, Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, vol.35, 1972, p.367 note 51.

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Innerwick Castle, East Lothian 1831 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2009, 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-innerwick-castle-east-lothian-r1134315, accessed 18 April 2024.