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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Perspective lectures c.1809-28 > I. Numbered Perspective Diagrams > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Lecture Diagram 40*: Perspective Method for a Circle (after Thomas Malton Senior) c.1810

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Lecture Diagram 40*: Perspective Method for a Circle (after Thomas Malton Senior)’ c.1810
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Lecture Diagram 40*: Perspective Method for a Circle (after Thomas Malton Senior) circa 1810
D17057
Turner Bequest CXCV 87
Pen and ink and watercolour on white wove paper, 486 x 685 mm
Watermarked ‘1794 | J WHATMAN’
Inscribed by Turner in red watercolour ‘40*’ top left and in black watercolour ‘T MALTON Sen.r’ top centre
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘87’ bottom left
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Prepared by Turner for Lecture 3 as Professor of Perspective at the Royal Academy, Diagram 40* depicts a perspective method for a circle described and illustrated in A Compleat Treatise on Perspective in Theor and Practice on the True Principles of Dr Brook Taylor (1775, pl.X, fig.49) by the elder Thomas Malton (1726–1801). According to Maurice Davies, Turner’s lecture text does not accurately represent the information given in Malton’s treatise.1 Since there is another diagram numbered 40 (Tate D17058; Turner Bequest CXCV 88) this starred item may have been a reserve illustration, or supplementary to Diagrams 38 and 39 representing methods for drawing a circle (Tate D17055, D17056; Turner Bequest CXCV 85, 86).
1
Davies 1994, p.127; Turner, ‘Royal Academy Lectures’, circa 1807–38, Department of Western Manuscripts, British Library, London, ADD MS 46151 M folio 13 verso.
Technical notes:
Peter Bower states that the sheet is Super Royal size Whatman paper made by William Balston and Finch and Thomas Robert Hollingworth at Turkey Mill, Maidstone, Kent. He writes that ‘all the sheets in this batch have some streaking across the sheet, probably from a fault in the sizing’.1
1
Notes in Tate catalogue files.
Verso:
Blank, save for an inscription by an unknown hand in pencil ‘T.L.444’ top left and ‘88’ bottom left.

Andrea Fredericksen
June 2004

Supported by The Samuel H. Kress Foundation

Revised by David Blayney Brown
January 2012

How to cite

Andrea Fredericksen, ‘Lecture Diagram 40*: Perspective Method for a Circle (after Thomas Malton Senior) c.1810 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2004, revised by David Blayney Brown, January 2012, 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-lecture-diagram-40-perspective-method-for-a-circle-after-r1136508, accessed 26 April 2024.