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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Farnley Hall and Yorkshire c.1808-24 > Farnley and Related Subjects > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Banks of the River Washburn, Looking South to Leathley Church c.1816-18

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Banks of the River Washburn, Looking South to Leathley Church’ c.1816-18
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
The Banks of the River Washburn, Looking South to Leathley Church c.1816–18
D12107
Turner Bequest CLIV I
Pencil on ‘Bristol Paper’, 204 x 256 mm
Stamped in brown ‘CLIV I’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This is one of three similarly-sized sketches (with D12105, D12106; Turner Bequest CLIV G, H) made on ‘Bristol Paper’1 all recording subjects in the Washburn Valley near Farnley Hall, the Yorkshire home of Turner’s patron Walter Fawkes. Peter Bower suggests that the three are rough quarters of a single sheet, originally approximately 394 x 520 mm. Bower also points out that such material was only rarely used for sketching by Turner, and he speculates that it was obtained from Farnley Hall.2 Presumably the three sketches were all made on the same visit, and given the proximity of subjects, probably on the same excursion.
This sketch looks from the right bank of the River Washburn below Lake Tiny near Farnley Hall downstream towards Leathley Church at the left, possibly from the rustic summer house The Pheasant’s (or ‘Peasant’s’) Nest, itself depicted in this group (Tate D12106). The sketch records similar material to D12105, from the same group, but from a lower and more distant viewpoint.
There is a splash of brown watercolour at the top left.
1
Bristol Paper is a laminate of two or more sheets of paper, with a highly glazed finish, named after the Earl of Bristol; see Bower 1990, p.108.
2
Bower 1990, p.109.
Verso:
Laid down.

David Hill
July 2009

How to cite

David Hill, ‘The Banks of the River Washburn, Looking South to Leathley Church c.1816–18 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, July 2009, 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-the-banks-of-the-river-washburn-looking-south-to-leathley-r1146609, accessed 23 April 2024.