Joseph Mallord William Turner

The larger of these sketches is compositionally similar to a drawing on folio 52 verso of this sketchbook (Tate D28141; Turner Bequest CCLXXXVII 52 a) and to two colour drawings on blue paper of Huy seen from a westerly perspective (Tate D20222, D20288; Turner Bequest CCXX O, CCXXIII C). As Cecilia Powell explains, this would be the view ‘seen by the traveller rounding the curve of the Meuse beneath Mont Picard and looking downstream to the widest façade of the fort [the citadel]... and the sturdy west tower of the church [of Notre-Dame]’.1

With the sketchbook turned in accordance with the foliation, Turner has drawn a small sketch on the lowermost register of the page. This depicts the ruins of the medieval castle of Crèvecoeur and the church of Bouvignes built into the rocky topography surrounding the Meuse valley. At the time Bouvignes was a small village moments north of Dinant and provided an impressive viewpoint from which to sketch the town from a distance.