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

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

Joseph Mallord William Turner Stirling Castle from the Esplanade 1831

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Stirling Castle from the Esplanade’ 1831
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 8 Verso:
Stirling Castle from the Esplanade 1831
D26451
Turner Bequest CCLXX 8a
Pencil on white wove paper, 125 x 201 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This sketch and another on folio 9 (D26452) depict Stirling Castle from near the esplanade to the south-east. While the current sketch shows the castle buildings in careful detail, the view on folio 9 pays closer attention to the rock on which the castle sits. The sketch at the top right of the present page is separate to the main sketch and seems to be a depiction of the castle that Turner abandoned unfinished. There are also two views of Stirling Castle from the nearby Ladies’ Rock on folios 16 and 16 verso (D26466, D26467), and views of the mountains to the west with an outline of the castle from the same point on folio 9 verso (D26453).
There is a remarkably similar sketch to this one in the Stirling and Edinburgh sketchbook of 1834 (Tate D26363; Turner Bequest CCLXIX 55).
For references to further sketches made at Stirling, see folio 13 (D16460).

Thomas Ardill
June 2010

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Stirling Castle from the Esplanade 1831 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2010, 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-stirling-castle-from-the-esplanade-r1134885, accessed 18 April 2024.