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 > IV. Diagrams after John Joshua Kirby's ... > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Lecture Diagram: A Cube with One Side Parallel to the Picture c.1823-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Lecture Diagram: A Cube with One Side Parallel to the Picture’ c.1823-8
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Lecture Diagram: A Cube with One Side Parallel to the Picture circa 1823–8
D16980
Turner Bequest CXCV 11
Pencil and watercolour on white wove paper, 545 x 757 mm
Watermarked ‘J WHATMAN | TURKEY MILL | 1823’
Inscribed by Turner in red watercolour ‘Picture’ centre, in red and black watercolour over pencil with various initial letters within diagram and in pencil ‘Last’ centre left and ‘4’ bottom left
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘11’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Prepared in connection with his lectures as Professor of Perspective at the Royal Academy, Turner’s diagram is based on a plate from Dr Brook Taylor’s Method of Perspective Made Easy; both in Theory and Practice: in Two Books (London 1768, vol.II, pl.IV, fig.5) by John Joshua Kirby (1716–74).1 According to Maurice Davies, it corresponds to a section of Turner lecture manuscript containing notes on methods, primarily based on Kirby, and used to support other lecture material when further examples of perspective were required.2
1
Kirby 1768, Book II, p.10.
2
Turner, ‘Royal Academy Lectures’, circa 1807–38, Department of Western Manuscripts, British Library, London, ADD MS 46151 AA folios 31–31 verso.
Technical notes:
Peter Bower writes that the sheet is Imperial size Whatman paper made by Finch and Thomas Robert Hollingworth, at Turkey Mill, Kent. Bower notes: ‘This paper is very heavily sized and bears some relationship to the Parchment Substitute papers produced by various hand made papermakers in the nineteenth century (and into the twentieth) for legal documents. Sometimes papermakers don’t quite keep up their quality control. In the case of this particular sheet [and about nine others from the same batch also used by Turner for his diagrams] the mould has been left, probably overnight, without being cleaned and small amounts of pulp have dried between the support bars under the mould cover and the two layers of woven wire making up the cover. This affects the drainage of the sheet during formation and leaves a clear impression of the mould’s actual structure and construction.’1
1
Notes in Tate catalogue files.
Verso:
Blank, save for an inscription by an unknown hand in pencil ‘38’ 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: A Cube with One Side Parallel to the Picture c.1823–8 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-a-cube-with-one-side-parallel-to-the-picture-r1136747, accessed 26 April 2024.