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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > West Country 1813 > Plymouth, Hamoaze Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A Rock Arch on Burgh Island 1813

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Rock Arch on Burgh Island’ 1813
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 260 Verso:
A Rock Arch on Burgh Island 1813
D09446
Turner Bequest CXXXI 171a
Pencil on white wove paper, 95 x 157 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
With the page turned horizontally, this drawing is part of a sequence working in from the back cover of the sketchbook, which correlates with accounts of a voyage Turner and others made from Plymouth south-east to Burgh Island, returning by land towards Plymouth. The sequence begins on folio 275 (D09476; Turner Bequest CXXXI 186a), under which the overall trip is discussed, and may extend as far as folio 228 verso (Tate D09382; Turner Bequest CXXXI 139a).
The sketches between here and folio 253 verso (D09432; CXXXI 164a) show Burgh Island, just off the coast at Bigbury-on-Sea and accessible across the beach at low tide. Turner’s party arrived by sea and continued to the mainland after a meal of shellfish. While these were being prepared, the artist’s companion Cyrus Redding ‘missed Turner, and found him, with a pencil and small book, near the summit of the island. I observed, too, he [‘was’ or ‘seemed’ in different versions] writing rather than drawing’ (for the full account, see under D09476).
The island is well known today for its art deco hotel, and this and the drawing on folio 259 verso (D09444; Turner Bequest CXXXI 170a) appear to show the rock arch nearby at the east end of the island, beside the hotel’s natural swimming pool cordoned off from the sea. Turner has recorded the outlines and strata of the rocks in some detail, using hatching and dark shading to a degree unusual for him.
Technical notes:
A stain towards the top right matches that on folio 261 recto opposite (D09447; CXXXI 172).

Matthew Imms
April 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘A Rock Arch on Burgh Island 1813 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2014, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, September 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-a-rock-arch-on-burgh-island-r1148176, accessed 26 April 2024.