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

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

Joseph Mallord William Turner Edinburgh from Calton Hill with the Stewart and Playfair Monuments 1834

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Edinburgh from Calton Hill with the Stewart and Playfair Monuments’ 1834
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 78 Recto:
Edinburgh from Calton Hill with the Stewart and Playfair Monuments 1834
D26408
Turner Bequest CCLXIX 78
Pencil on off-white wove paper, 113 x 190 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘all grey upper-centre left, ‘v yellow’ upper-centre right
Inscribed in blue ink by John Ruskin ‘78’ bottom left inverted and ‘340’ top left inverted
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIX 78’ top left inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Drawn with the sketchbook inverted, this view of Edinburgh from Calton’s Hill is an elaboration of the sketch on folio 77 verso (D26407). The view is from the top of Calton Hill at the south-east corner of the Royal Observatory. In the foreground at the right is the John Playfair Monument, and to the right at the centre of the page is the monument to Dugald Stewart. Beyond these lies the city of Edinburgh with the darkly shaded castle and North Bridge. Compared to folio 77 verso, Turner paid less attention in this sketch to the architecture of the two monuments, concentrating instead on light and shadow and colour in the sky which he noted was ‘all grey’ at he left and ‘v[ery] yellow’ to the right.
This sketch belongs to a series of views of Edinburgh from near the Stewart Monument; see folio 79 verso (D26411) for details.

Thomas Ardill
November 2010

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Edinburgh from Calton Hill with the Stewart and Playfair Monuments 1834 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, November 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-edinburgh-from-calton-hill-with-the-stewart-and-playfair-r1136338, accessed 19 April 2024.