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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Tantallon Castle and The Bass Rock 1822

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 79 Verso:
Tantallon Castle and The Bass Rock 1822
D17647
Turner Bequest CC 79a
Pencil on white wove paper, 187 x 114 mm
Blindstamped with the Turner Bequest stamp bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Returning to London from Edinburgh by boat Turner sketched Tantallon Castle and Bass Rock from the water as he passed between them (see folio 79; D17646) and, turning to his right and left, continued drawing them as he moved away to the south-east. At the top of the present page, used with the sketchbook turned to the right, Tantallon Castle is seen from a little way to the east, perched on a cliffy headland. The castle is shown again in the third and forth sketches, now from further away so that more of the coastline is in view as well as North Berwick Law, which is seen in the distance to the west. Turner had made a similar sketch of this view in the Bass Rock and Edinburgh sketchbook in 1818 (Tate D13332; Turner Bequest CLXV 6a).
The two Bass Rock sketches, the second from top and the bottom sketch, show the island from the east, with the now familiar motif of a boat passing by in the upper sketch (see folio 78 verso; D17645 and folio 79).
Turner’s final sketches of Tantallon and the Bass are on the opposite page (folio 80; D17648).

Thomas Ardill
August 2008

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Tantallon Castle and The Bass Rock 1822 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2008, 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-tantallon-castle-and-the-bass-rock-r1132988, accessed 28 March 2024.