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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Fowey Estuary; Fowey Blockhouse 1811

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 31 Verso:
The Fowey Estuary; Fowey Blockhouse 1811
D08420
Turner Bequest CXXIII 31a
Pencil on white wove writing paper, 75 x 117 mm
Part watermark ‘th | 6’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Fowy’ top left, upside down
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
When turned with the gutter below the drawings, the lower sketch is to the north-east up the Fowey Estuary, with Polruan on the right. The upper view, inverted in relation to it, is one in a series of the blockhouses at Fowey and Polruan, on opposite sides of the estuary; it is detailed enough for the structure to be differentiated from the north front of the Polruan blockhouse, which survives largely intact, and presumably shows instead the south front of its equivalent on the Fowey shoreline, of which little remains.
The two drawings were probably made from about the same viewpoint, north of Readymoney Cove. The main view of the blockhouse on folio 37 verso (D08432) is similar. For other views in and around Fowey see under folio 5 verso (D08371).

Matthew Imms
June 2011

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The Fowey Estuary; Fowey Blockhouse 1811 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2011, 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-the-fowey-estuary-fowey-blockhouse-r1136897, accessed 29 March 2024.