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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner St Michael's Mount: The Western Range of the Castle 1811

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 37 Verso:
St Michael’s Mount: The Western Range of the Castle 1811
D08919
Turner Bequest CXXV 36a
Pencil on white wove paper, 166 x 208 mm
Watermark ‘Fellows | 1808’
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram bottom left
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner looks up at the west front of the castle from the level of the batteries on that side of the island. This aspect has been the least affected by later rebuilding, which seems to have been limited mainly to altering and enlarging various windows and the addition of a low, crenellated gable at the left-hand end. The inconspicuous entrance door to the castle is just to the left of centre on this side.1 The distant coastline to the south-east continues a little way onto folio 38 recto opposite (D08920; CXXV 37).
The view is part of a series made in sequence from below the castle. The sketch on folios 35 verso–36 recto (D08916, D08917; CXXV 34a–35) shows the north-western corner, and that on folios 38 verso–39 recto (D08921, D08922; CXXV 37a–38), the south-western. For other views of the site, see under folio 32 recto (D08910; CXXV 31).

Matthew Imms
February 2011

1
Compare modern photograph in St Michael’s Mount, Norwich 1969, inside front cover.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘St Michael’s Mount: The Western Range of the Castle 1811 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 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-st-michaels-mount-the-western-range-of-the-castle-r1137402, accessed 18 September 2024.