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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > West Country 1811 > Devonshire Coast, No.1 Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A West Country Harbour with Shipping and a Tower on the Coast Beyond 1811

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A West Country Harbour with Shipping and a Tower on the Coast Beyond’ 1811
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 95 Verso
A West Country Harbour with Shipping and a Tower on the Coast Beyond 1811
D08544
Turner Bequest CXXIII 92a
Pencil on white wove printing paper, 75 x 117 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
What appears to be a tower with three window apertures stands below rocky cliffs beyond which a coastline stretches into the distance. In the foreground are other buildings and the masts of ships. The subject remains unidentified, and does not, for example, appear to be Kingswear Castle on the Dart Estuary, as shown on folio 3 recto (D08366) and elsewhere, as that building is further from the coast itself relative to the one shown here.
Technical notes:
There is a prominent diagonal fold towards the lower left, apparently a production fault occurring between the printing of the text on the recto (D08543) and the binding of the leaf – part of the text is obscured but the edges are trimmed flush.

Matthew Imms
June 2011

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘A West Country Harbour with Shipping and a Tower on the Coast Beyond 1811 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 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-a-west-country-harbour-with-shipping-and-a-tower-on-the-r1137021, accessed 23 April 2024.