Joseph Mallord William Turner

This work is one of a group of more than thirty watercolour studies in the Turner Bequest that appear to be preparatory sketches for Campbell’s Poetical Works. They are all painted on cheap, lightweight paper and executed in a rough, loose style. The subject of this study appears to be the beginnings of a forest scene. Although it is too vague to be conclusively linked to any particular finished illustration, Jan Piggott has suggested that it may represent a preliminary sketch for The Waterfall circa 1835 (National Gallery of Scotland), one of two watercolours Turner produced to accompany Campbell’s poem ‘Gertrude of Wyoming’.1 The cool earth colours of the palette certainly recall the lush verdant scenes of both The Waterfall and the second vignette, The Valley (National Gallery of Scotland).2

The work was once part of a parcel of studies described by John Ruskin as ‘A.B. 40. PO. Vignette beginnings, once on a roll. Worthless’.3 For an explanation of his meaning of ‘once on a roll’ see the technical notes above. Finberg records how Ruskin later described his phrasing in a letter to Ralph Nicholson Wornum as ‘horrible’, adding ‘I never meant it to be permanent’.4

Technical notes:
Peter Bower has noted that this study is made on off-white low-grade machine-made cartridge paper. The maker is unknown and there is no watermark. This paper would have been relatively cheap to buy and could have been purchased from a colourman, cut off from a roll to the desired size. Turner has used the ‘felt’ side of the paper which has slightly more texture than the ‘wire’ side, allowing better adhesion of pigment and graphite to the surface of the sheet. Many of Turner’s vignette studies were made on a similar grade of machine-made paper, and the artist employed the ‘felt’ side on all of them.1

Verso:

Inscribed by unknown hands in pencil ‘AB 40 P | O’ bottom right and ‘D27569’ bottom left