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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Distant View of Llanthony Abbey 1792

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Distant View of Llanthony Abbey 1792
D00135
Turner Bequest XII F
Pencil on white wove paper, 200 x 270 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Llanthony [?Abbey]’ lower right (almost all trimmed away)
Stamped in black ‘XII F’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
A finished watercolour of this subject is Tate D00679 (Turner Bequest XXVII R);1 another is in a private collection.2 These may have been made in response to the commissions recorded in Turner’s inscription on the verso. The subject was to prove a fertile one for Turner; an aquatint after the private collection version was published in 1823, and a view of Llanthony derived from this pencil drawing was to appear among the later plates of the Picturesque Views in England and Wales.3 Other views of Llanthony Abbey made on this tour are Tate D00136 (Turner Bequest XII G) and its verso (D40036); see also Tate D00368 (Turner Bequest XXII O).
1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.308 no.65, pl.13.
2
Ibid., p.308 no.66, reproduced.
3
Ibid., p.401 no.863, pl.198.
Verso:
Blank; inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘<’ [crossed through] |‘Mr Clithero 1 New Ormond Street | Mr Clutterbuck 2 Gn ½’; stamped in brown ink with Turner Bequest monogram; inscribed in a modern hand ‘4’.

Andrew Wilton
April 2012

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Distant View of Llanthony Abbey 1792 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2012, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-distant-view-of-llanthony-abbey-r1141120, accessed 25 April 2024.