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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > The Second Meuse-Moselle Tour 1839 > First Mossel and Oxford Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Distant Forts at Coblenz from the Moselle Ehrenbreitstein from the Moselle; Ehrenbreitstein, Coblenz and the Moselle Bridge, Looking down the Moselle; Part of Coblenz upstream from the Moselle Bridge 1839

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Distant Forts at Coblenz from the Moselle Ehrenbreitstein from the Moselle; Ehrenbreitstein, Coblenz and the Moselle Bridge, Looking down the Moselle; Part of Coblenz upstream from the Moselle Bridge’ 1839
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 8 Verso:
Distant Forts at Coblenz from the Moselle Ehrenbreitstein from the Moselle; Ehrenbreitstein, Coblenz and the Moselle Bridge, Looking down the Moselle; Part of Coblenz upstream from the Moselle Bridge 1839
D28306
Turner Bequest CCLXXXIX 8 a
Pencil on white wove drawing paper, 235 x 140 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘B’ at right beneath the bridge
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Here Turner has drawn a series of six views of Koblenz, taken from a variety of different perspectives on the Moselle and Rhine Rivers. The imposing Ehrenbreitstein fortress is prominent in all of the sketches; while the view of Koblenz with the Moselle Bridge also incorporates the twin towers of the Basilica of St Castor and those of the Liebfrauenkirche which are decorated with elaborate onion cupolas.
For other drawings of Ehrenbreitstein and Koblenz in this sketchbook see Tate D28297, D28301–D28303, D28316, D28317; Turner Bequest CCLXXXIX 4, 6–7, 13a, 14. For other 1839 drawings of the fortress see the Trèves to Cochem and Coblenz to Mayence sketchbook (Tate D28351– D28353, D28356, D28437–D28447, D28530–D28533; Turner Bequest CCXC 1–2, 3a, 44–49, 88–89a); and the Cochem to Coblenz – Home sketchbook (Tate D28603, D28605–D28607; Turner Bequest CCXCI 34a, 35a–36a).
For earlier depictions of Ehrenbreitstein see the Waterloo and Rhine sketchbook of 1817 (Tate D12781–D12783, D12802–D12806, D12809; Turner Bequest CLX 42–43, 52a–54a, 56); the Rhine sketchbook of the same date (Tate D12894, D12899, D12901–D12902, D12908; Turner Bequest 7, 10, 11–11a, 15); the Rivers Meuse and Moselle sketchbook of 1824 (Tate D19785, D19818–D19821, D19826–D19830; Turner Bequest CCXVI 117a, 134–135a, 140). There are also a number of fine colour drawings depicting the fortress and neighbouring Coblenz, some of which include: Tate D24804, D24809, D24833, D36138, D36206; Turner Bequest CCLIX 239, 244, 268, CCCLXIV 285, 346.

Alice Rylance-Watson
August 2013

How to cite

Alice Rylance-Watson, ‘Distant Forts at Coblenz from the Moselle Ehrenbreitstein from the Moselle; Ehrenbreitstein, Coblenz and the Moselle Bridge, Looking down the Moselle; Part of Coblenz upstream from the Moselle Bridge 1839 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-distant-forts-at-coblenz-from-the-moselle-ehrenbreitstein-r1150587, accessed 24 April 2024.