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

This sketch and the one on the previous folio (Tate D28100; Turner Bequest 31) formed the basis for a gouache, pen and ink and watercolour drawing of Franchimont and the valley of the Hoëgne river (Tate D20269; Turner Bequest CCXXII J). The previous sketch, Cecilia Powell writes, ‘provided the general composition of the castle perched on its hill above the valley, but the compact and sturdy shape of the castle in the gouache is taken from f.31v [31a]’.1 Both pencil sketches ‘were drawn as Turner crossed the Hoëgne at Marché de Theux and walked up the hillside to look at the castle at close quarters’.2 The artist made records of the three heraldic shields carved on the entrance portal on the folio opposite (Tate D28102; Turner Bequest CCLXXXVII 32).

Turner has drawn a small sketch of the village of Marché with Franchimont castle atop the hill in the distance. The bottom of the sketch continues onto the folio opposite and the inscriptions ‘Rock’, ‘Babbly brook’ and ‘Mills’ have been added to annotate it.

For other views of Franchimont Castle in this sketchbook see Tate D28095–D28099, D28103–D280104; Turner Bequest CCLXXXVII 28–30a, 32a–33. For colour studies of it produced in gouache, pen and ink and watercolour on blue paper see Tate D20266, D20269, D20280, D20289, D24732; Turner Bequest CCXXII G, J, U, CCXXIII D, CCLIX 167.