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 Plymouth Sound with Drake's Island and the Great Mew Stone across Firestone Bay 1813

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Plymouth Sound with Drake's Island and the Great Mew Stone across Firestone Bay’ 1813
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 18 Recto:
Plymouth Sound with Drake’s Island and the Great Mew Stone across Firestone Bay 1813
D09235
Turner Bequest CXXXI 18
Pencil on white wove paper, 95 x 157 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘18’ bottom right, descending vertically, and ‘6’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CXXXI – 18’ bottom left, descending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
With the page turned horizontally, the view, recognisable today from Admiralty Road above Firestone Bay, is south-east across Plymouth Sound, past Drake’s Island on the left to the Great Mew Stone in the distance towards the right. The shore at Mount Edgcumbe is indicated in the middle distance at the right-hand edge. There is a similar, albeit rather compressed, view on folio 274 verso (D09474; CXXXI 185a) from the sequence working in from the back of the sketchbook recording a voyage to the Mew Stone and beyond. Mount Edgcumbe itself is seen from the same viewpoint or nearby on folio 19 recto (D09236).
The subjects as far as folio 127 recto (D09358) are all identified or presumed sites within a few miles in and around Plymouth, suggesting a series of fairly short excursions.
Verso:
Blank

Matthew Imms
April 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Plymouth Sound with Drake’s Island and the Great Mew Stone across Firestone Bay 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-plymouth-sound-with-drakes-island-and-the-great-mew-stone-r1147962, accessed 25 April 2024.