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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Italianate Landscapes and Classical ... > Studies of Landscapes, Townscapes and ... > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Two Wooded Landscapes, One with a Classical Building c.1828-45

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Two Wooded Landscapes, One with a Classical Building’ c.1828-45
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Two Wooded Landscapes, One with a Classical Building c.1828–45
D34854
Turner Bequest CCCXLIV 366
Pencil on white laid paper, 225 x 365 mm
Partial watermark ‘28’
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram at centre
Inscribed in red ink ‘366’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCCXLIV 366’ bottom left, descending vertically
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
There are two loose variations on wooded, hilly landscapes here, divided by rough horizontal pencil lines. They are rapid permutations of the landscape motifs of Claude Lorrain, a consistent influence on Turner (see the Introduction to this subsection). At the top, a distant town or large building is lit by the sun over the highest peak on the left; below, there is what seems to be a classical portico or rotunda on the left, and the sun is lower down to its right, with a wavy reflection in water in the foreground.
Tate D34851–D34856 (Turner Bequest CCCXLIV 363–368) are all on two sides of a quartered single sheet, as discussed in the technical notes; the other quarters were also mainly used for landscape studies, as described under D34851, where there is also a note on dating.
Technical notes:
Tate D34851–D34856 (Turner Bequest CCCXLIV 363–368) are all on two sides of a single sheet folded into quarters, with the watermark ‘John Hall | 1828’ exactly at the centre; each averages approximately 183 x 213 mm of the overall dimensions. Finberg listed them individually as ‘folded’,1 albeit without noting their all being on one sheet; once folded firmly into four, they were lightly folded twice more, leaving three parallel creases across each quarter.
In terms of the whole sheet when aligned vertically, D34851–D34854 (CCCXLIV 363–366) are on one side, at the top left, bottom left, top right and bottom right relative to each other. D34855 and D34856 (CCCXLIV 367, 368) are on the other side, at the bottom left and right relative to each other, the upper half being blank. D34855 (CCCXLIV 367) is on the other side of the present work, and D34856 on the other side of D34852. The sheet is almost ripped in half by a jagged tear along the right-hand half of the horizontal fold (that is, the right-hand edge of the present quarter viewed independently); it also extends diagonally across D34851.
There are small brown spots towards the top left and right

Matthew Imms
August 2016

1
See Finberg 1909, II, p.1143.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Two Wooded Landscapes, One with a Classical Building c.1828–45 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2017, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-two-wooded-landscapes-one-with-a-classical-building-r1185728, accessed 17 May 2024.