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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Scotland 1834 > Edinburgh Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Abbotsford 1834

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Abbotsford’ 1834
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 52 Verso:
Abbotsford 1834
D26197
Turner Bequest CCLXVIII 52a
Pencil on white wove paper, 111 x 181 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Abbotsford, the neo-gothic house built by Sir Walter Scott near Melrose in the Scottish Borders, is seen here from the north-east in a simple but careful sketch of the architecture and its surrounding landscape.
It was executed on 3 October 1834 on an excursion from Edinburgh to the Scottish Borders during which Turner sketched sites connected to Scott’s life and work. He made only three sketches of the houses of which this is the most carefully executed (see also folios 47 and 47 verso; D26186, D26187), and two more of the River Tweed nearby (folios 48, 48 verso; D26188, D26189). However, despite the very scrappy nature of the other two sketches, they seem to have formed the compositional basis of the watercolour design for an illustration to John Gibson Lockhart’s Life of Scott: Abbotsford from the Northern Bank of the Tweed, circa 1836 (whereabouts unknown).1 See folio 47 for more information.
There is a light brown stain at the top centre of this page.

Thomas Ardill
January 2011

1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.435 no.1142.

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Abbotsford 1834 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, January 2011, 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-abbotsford-r1136125, accessed 19 April 2024.