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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Cheshire, Derbyshire, North Wales ... > Kirkstall Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Kirkstall Abbey: the Dormitory Undercroft 1808

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Kirkstall Abbey: the Dormitory Undercroft’ 1808
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 6 Recto:
Kirkstall Abbey: the Dormitory Undercroft 1808
D07263
Turner Bequest CVII 6
Pencil on white wove paper, 109 x 186 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘6’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CVII 6’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This is the same subject, from a different angle, as a watercolour exhibited by Turner at the Royal Academy in 1798, under the title Refectory of Kirkstall Abbey, Yorkshire (Sir John Soane’s Museum, London).1 In fact, the subject is the dormitory undercroft as noted by David Hill.2 This later sketch hints at standing water and sheltering cattle as also seen in the watercolour. For Turner’s design of the same subject for the Liber Studiorum see Tate D08142; Turner Bequest CXVII O.
1
Andrew Wilton, The Life and Work of J.M.W. Turner, Fribourg 1979, p.325 no.234.
2
David Hill, Turner in the North: A Tour through Derbyshire, Yorkshire, Durham, Northumberland, the Scottish Borders, the Lake District, Lancashire and Lincolnshire in the Year 1797, New Haven and London 1996, p.22.
Verso:
Blank

David Blayney Brown
October 2010

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Kirkstall Abbey: the Dormitory Undercroft 1808 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, October 2010, 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-kirkstall-abbey-the-dormitory-undercroft-r1135923, accessed 19 April 2024.