Joseph Mallord William Turner

Rocks on the Meuse at Marche-les-Dames

c.1839

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In Tate Britain

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Artist
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Part of
Meuse-Moselle Gouache and Watercolour Drawings
Medium
Gouache and watercolour on paper
Dimensions
Support: 137 × 189 mm
Collection
Tate
Acquisition
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Reference
D20262
Turner Bequest CCXXII C

Display caption

The romantic name of Marche-les-Dames (no.91) derives from the foundation of a twelfth-century abbey in an adjacent side-valley by 139 noble ladies who were the widows of Crusaders. Turner has used gouache, lightly applied with a brush, rather than pen and ink, to show both the characteristic fissures in the oolitic cliffs above the village and all the details of both buildings and the riverside. The resulting criss-cross effect is unusual but the pinkness of his rocks here is similar to that in other scenes on both the Meuse (no.92) and the Mosel (no.49).

Gallery label, August 2004

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