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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Scotland 1831 > Berwick Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner ?Fast Castle on the East Lothian Coast 1831

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘?Fast Castle on the East Lothian Coast’ 1831
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 47 Verso:
?Fast Castle on the East Lothian Coast 1831
D25729
Turner Bequest CCLXV 47a
Pencil on white wove paper, 59 x 96 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ?‘Ber’ centre left
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
These three sketches of a ruined tower, drawn with the sketchbook inverted, belong to a series of studies of a tower over folios 47–48 and 49 (D25728–D25730, D25732). An inscription on folio 49 refers to Fast Castle, which is a plausible identification of the sketch on folio 47. However, an inscription on the present page does not seem to refer to that building, and may read ‘Ber[wick]’. The structure also bears a resemblance to the ruins of Norham Castle (see Tate D26027; Turner Bequest CCLXVII 59a), although this would place the sketch very much out of sequence with the rest of the sketchbook.

Thomas Ardill
September 2009

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘?Fast Castle on the East Lothian Coast 1831 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2009, 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-fast-castle-on-the-east-lothian-coast-r1134093, accessed 18 September 2024.