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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Wales 1798 > Hereford Court Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Snowdon from the Valley of the Seiont 1798

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Snowdon from the Valley of the Seiont’ 1798
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 63 Recto:
Snowdon from the Valley of the Seiont 1798
D01352
Turner Bequest XXXVIII 98
Pencil and watercolour on white wove paper, 229 x 332 mm
Blind-stamped bottom centre with Turner Bequest monogram
Stamped in black ‘XXXVIII 98’ bottom left, descending vertically
This subject has much in common with the famous view of Snowdon painted by Richard Wilson (1713 –1782; versions at Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool and Nottingham Castle Museum) from the west, looking up the valley of the Nantlle with Mynydd Mawr and Y Garn flanking the valley to left and right, with Llyn Nantlle in the centre. However, the artist Kyffin Williams (1918–2006) has suggested that it is perhaps a view of the mountain from rather further north, looking south-east along the valley of the River Seiont towards Llyn Padarn; see folios 65 recto and 66 recto (D01330, D01351; Turner Bequest XXXVIII 76, 97). Edward Yardley has pointed out similarities with the large watercolours of Cader Idris that Turner completed after this tour (currently untraced),1 and proposes that the mountain in this drawing is in fact Cader.2 Compare also folio 71 recto (D01337; Turner Bequest XXXVIII 83).
1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.328 nos.259, reproduced, 260.
2
See Yardley 1986, p.57; this may be the drawing erroneously given there as on ‘p. 92’ of this sketchbook.
Verso:
Blank; stamped in brown ink with Turner Bequest monogram.

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Snowdon from the Valley of the Seiont 1798 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, April 2015, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-snowdon-from-the-valley-of-the-seiont-r1173203, accessed 25 April 2024.