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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Northern France 1832 > Guernsey Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Villequier, Normandy; Sark, Channel Islands ?1832

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Villequier, Normandy; Sark, Channel Islands’ ?1832
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 20 Recto:
Villequier, Normandy; Sark, Channel Islands ?1832
D23556
Turner Bequest CCLII 20
Pencil on white wove paper, 114 x 187 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘villkie’ centre left, ‘wreck’ centre, and ‘Sark’ bottom centre
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘20’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLII – 20’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner drew four long waterside vistas across the entire length of this page. The topography depicted in the top two sketches and the semi-legible inscription point to a location near the village of Villequier on the Normandy banks of the Seine. For a comparison, see Turner’s watercolour of Villequier of around this date, see Tate D24669 (Turner Bequest CCLIX 104).
The various inscriptions around the bottom two sketches indicate the terrain of the Channel Islands. The scene second from the bottom is inscribed ‘wreck’, while the inscription on the bottom sketch, next to a listing sail-boat or buoy, locates the view on or around Sark.

John Chu
April 2014

How to cite

John Chu, ‘Villequier, Normandy; Sark, Channel Islands ?1832 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2014, 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-villequier-normandy-sark-channel-islands-r1175048, accessed 16 April 2024.