Joseph Mallord William Turner

With the sketchbook orientated in accordance with the foliation, there is a group of figures at the top left: a woman with carrying a basket under her arm whom Turner has labelled with the letter ‘B’ and a reclining figure to her right labelled with the letter ‘R’. There is a further figure beneath them next to whom Turner has inscribed ‘Man w[ith] pig’.

With the sketchbook orientated horizontally relative to the foliation, Turner has drawn two views of the environs in and around Liège running parallel to one another. The first, closest to the gutter of the sketchbook, depicts the façades of buildings with the Tour St Denis to the right. In the second, Turner has tentatively marked out a rocky topography through which a coach and horses travel. The faint under-drawing of an undeveloped view can be made out beneath.

For other drawings of Liège in this sketchbook see the following folios: Tate D28066, D28068, D28070–D28071, D28073–D28074, D28076; Turner Bequest CCLXXXVII 13, 14, 15–15a, 16a–17, 18. For Turner’s earlier views of the city see the Rivers Meuse and Moselle sketchbook of 1824 (Tate D19598, D19636–D19638, D20061–D20064; Turner Bequest CCXVI 24, 43a–44a, 260a–262); the Huy and Dinant sketchbook of the same date (Tate D20084, D20095–D20103; Turner Bequest CCXVII 1, 8–12); the Holland, Meuse and Cologne sketchbook of 1825 (Tate D19446–D19447, D19520–D19521; Turner Bequest CCXV 25a–26, 71a–72); and the Holland sketchbook of the same date (Tate D19160; Turner Bequest CCXIV 162). There are also drawings of Liège in the 1833 Brussels up to Mannheim–Rhine sketchbook (Tate D29669–D29670, D29673; Turner Bequest CCXCVI 37a–38, 39a). For colour studies of the city in gouache, pen and ink and watercolour see Tate D24664, D20283; Turner Bequest CCLIX 99, CCXXII X.