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

Inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, this drawing possibly forms a double-page view with folio 41 recto opposite (D22399). As with adjacent pages, the subject is perhaps the Dudley Canal at Tipton, looking south towards Dudley Castle on the skyline. There appear to be boats in the foreground and industrial buildings in the middle distance. Later development and trees hamper the establishment of a precise viewpoint. Turner’s watercolour Dudley, Worcestershire of about 1832 (Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight),1 engraved in 1835 for the Picturesque Views in England and Wales (Tate impressions: T05097, T06113, T06114), combines the castle ruins on the skyline with a busy foreground comprising a canal and industrial buildings including smoking chimneys and furnaces. The building with a chimney towards the left here may have informed one with a similar silhouette to the left of centre in the watercolour.

For other views of Dudley, see under folio 39 recto (D22395).

Technical notes:

This leaf is affected by the extensive pale brown, mottled staining which extends throughout this particular gathering (folios 31–42; D22379–D22402) and also folios 30 and 43 recto and verso (D22377, D22378, D22403, D22404), as discussed in the Technical notes to the sketchbook’s Introduction.