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

These four sketches, rendered in agile line, show aspects of the Belgian city of Dinant. They were taken by Turner from outside Dinant’s medieval stone ramparts. The central views depict the city’s imposing fortified gateways and ‘ancient wall[s]’, with the spire of Notre-Dame suggested in the distance in tentative outline. Turner’s inscription ‘Monsieur Decoux Hotel de Poste’ is a note recording the name of the proprietor of one of Givet’s inns. The ‘Post’ inn was the best of lodgings of them all, according to the travel writer John Murray, with the ‘Tête d’Or’ coming second.1

For other views of Dinant taken in 1824, see Tate D19655–D19659, D19661–D19663, D20109–D20113; Turner Bequest CCXVI 53–55, 56–57, CCXVII 16–19. For later views see Tate D28094, D28122, D28125, D28142, D28147, D28153, D28155–D28158, D28160–D28166, D41091; Turner Bequest CCLXXXVII 27a, 42a, 44a, 53, 56a, 59a, 60a–62a, 63a–66a. There are also colour sketches of the town produced in gouache on blue paper in 1839, some with pen and ink and watercolour added (Tate D20227, D20228, D24724, D28984; Turner Bequest CCXX T, U; CCLIX 159, CCXCII 37).