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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Scotland 1818-20 > Bass Rock and Edinburgh Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Ruins of Dunbar 1818

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Ruins of Dunbar’ 1818
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 20 Verso:
Ruins of Dunbar 1818
D13358
Turner Bequest CLXV 20a
Pencil on white laid paper, 99 x 159 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This very rough sketch, as Finberg suggests, probably shows the outline of the ruins of Dunbar Castle.1 The two tower shapes at the top of the sketch could be the ruins that are shown in Turner’s Dunbar, circa 1823 (watercolour, private collection),2 with the rocky promontory beneath. There are more easily identifiable sketches of these ruins later in the sketchbook.

Thomas Ardill
October 2007

1
Finberg 1909, I, p.479, CLXV 20a.
2
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.426 no.1066.

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Ruins of Dunbar 1818 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, October 2007, 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-ruins-of-dunbar-r1131900, accessed 19 April 2024.