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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Northern France 1832 > Guernsey Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner La Coupée, Sark Island ?1832

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘La Coupée, Sark Island’ ?1832
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 56 Recto:
La Coupée, Sark Island ?1832
D23625
Turner Bequest CCLII 56
Pencil on white wove paper, 114 x 187 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Coupe’ centre
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘56’ top left, inverted
Stamped in black ‘CCLII – 56’ top left, inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner filled this page with panoramic views of Sark’s high jagged cliffs. The two sketches at the top of the page are inverted in relation to the sketchbook as foliated and the cursory drawing to the right was taken with the page turned vertically. As indicated by Turner’s note, the sketch in the centre of the page records the point at which Little Sark is joined to the main island by an extremely high and narrow isthmus called La Coupée.1 This geological feature constitutes one of the volume’s major preoccupations, and recurs on folios 56 verso (D23626; Turner Bequest CCLII 56a); 57 recto (D23627; Turner Bequest CCLII 57); 59 verso (D23632; Turner Bequest CCLII 59a); 60 recto (D23633; Turner Bequest CCLII 60); 61 recto to 62 verso (D23635–D23638; Turner Bequest CCLII 62a); 73 recto to 74 recto (D23659–D23661; Turner Bequest CCLII 74).

John Chu
April 2014

1
J.T. Cochrane, A Guide to the Island of Guernsey, St Peter Port 1826, p.141.

How to cite

John Chu, ‘La Coupée, Sark Island ?1832 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, April 2015, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-la-coupee-sark-island-r1175117, accessed 20 September 2024.