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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Architectural and Other Subjects c.1797 ... > Fonthill Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Colour Tests c.1799-1807

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Colour Tests’ c.1799-1807
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Colour Tests c.1799–1807
D41466
Turner Bequest XLVII 37v
Watercolour on white wove paper, 330 x 470 mm
Watermark ‘J Whatman 1794’
Stamped in black with Turner Bequest monogram over ‘XLVII – 37’ towards bottom left
These extensive colour trials may relate to the view of Chalfont House developed in watercolour on D02226 (Turner Bequest XLVII 49), which was perhaps originally bound opposite, although several other pages were also worked up in colour. The recto of the present leaf is a pencil view of Oxford (D02214; Turner Bequest XLVII 37).
Technical notes:
For a proposed sequence for the leaves of the disbound Fonthill sketchbook, with this page as folio 3, see the Introduction.

Matthew Imms
February 2015

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Colour Tests c.1799–1807 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 2015, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, April 2015, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-colour-tests-r1174219, accessed 13 December 2025.