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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Spring Tour of Northern France 1845 > Boulogne Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A Viaduct in a Valley ?near Boulogne 1845

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Viaduct in a Valley ?near Boulogne’ 1845
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 7 Recto:
A Viaduct in a Valley ?near Boulogne 1845
D35410
Turner Bequest CCCLVIII 8
Gouache, pencil and watercolour on white wove paper, 230 x 326 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘8’ bottom right
Blind stamped with Turner Bequest monogram towards bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCCLVIII 8’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Unique as a representation of an inland scene in this first half of the sketchbook as foliated, this composition bears closer comparison with pages in the contemporary Ideas of Folkestone sketchbook (especially Tate D35373; Turner Bequest CCCLVI 13). In both, warm washes of ochre, yellow, and red depict a valley of soft undulating hills bridged by a scarlet viaduct and a terminated by a distant tower. The judicious use of gouache to strengthen landscape contours, relatively few areas of reserved paper, and the application of translucent glazes onto dried washes suggest a composition painted at several sittings.
Almost at the centre of the page is a zigzag of grey paint representing rising smoke, perhaps indicative of the presence of an unseen section of railway or simply the chimney of a hidden building. The line between Paris and Boulogne was not opened until 1848, so this sketch may depict a landscape in the midst of modernisation.1
1
Georges Oustric, ‘Un siècle de croissance économique (1815–1914)’ in Alain Lottin (ed.), Histoire de Boulogne-sur-Mer, Boulogne-sur-Mer 1998, p.224.
Verso:
Blank, except for small patches of blue watercolour from folio 8 recto (D35411; Turner Bequest CCCLVIII 9).

John Chu
November 2013

How to cite

John Chu, ‘A Viaduct in a Valley ?near Boulogne 1845 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, November 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-a-viaduct-in-a-valley-near-boulogne-r1173511, accessed 18 April 2024.