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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > East Sussex c.1806-20 > Hastings Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Costings for the 'Liber Studiorum' (Inscriptions by Turner) c.1809-14

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Costings for the 'Liber Studiorum' (Inscriptions by Turner)’ c.1809-14
Folio 97 Verso:
Costings for the ‘Liber Studiorum’ (Inscriptions by Turner) circa 1809–14
D07749
Turner Bequest CXI 97a
Pencil and pen and ink on white wove paper, 110 x 88 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil and ink (see main catalogue entry)
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner’s inscriptions, mainly in pencil; but with several numbers in ink, read:
81 Prints at 15             £60     15     0 
16 Proofs at 25              20      0     0 
                             80     15
     
 4 Proofs Miller 12 P.  
 3 Prints to Holworthy 
 3 Delamotte 
 6 Miss Parr 
16 
     
          100 Prints  – at 15        75     15 
           20 Proofs  – at 25        24      9 
           one Number               100.  
     
Expenses of one Number               61      1     6 
                    clear.           39     19     6 
 20 
 16 
120     320 
Turner lists expenses and receipts for the Liber Studiorum including sales of prints. The engraver William Miller (1796–1882) was presumably too young to be the buyer named here. The next must be the artist James Holworthy (1781–1841) who paid for a first number of the Liber on 19 March 1814, as observed by John Gage who, nevertheless, dates Holworthy’s appearance in this sketchbook to 1811.1 The artist William Delamotte (1775–1863) was already a collector of Turner and an enthusiast of his prints. Miss Parr is unidentified.
Turner assumes 120 subscriptions for plates, initially at fifteen shillings per number for prints and twenty-five for proofs. Allowing for costs against sales, he estimates the clear profit of one number of the Liber at £39. 19. 6 which he rounds up to £40 when continuing his sums on folio 96 verso of the sketchbook (D07747).

David Blayney Brown
May 2011

1
Gage 1980, p.260.

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Costings for the ‘Liber Studiorum’ (Inscriptions by Turner) c.1809–14’, catalogue entry, May 2011, 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/costings-for-the-liber-studiorum-inscriptions-by-turner-r1131236, accessed 26 April 2024.