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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Tour of Yorkshire 1816 > Yorkshire 4 Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Skipton Castle from the North 1816

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Skipton Castle from the North’ 1816
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 7 Verso:
Skipton Castle from the North 1816
D11454
Turner Bequest CXLVII 7a
Pencil on white wove paper, 125 x 206 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
In this writer’s opinion, Turner visited Skipton at both the beginning and the end of his tour of 1816, on 17 July and 11 August. The orientation of this sketch, inverted in relation to the main sequence of subjects in the sketchbook, suggests that it was made at the end of the tour. It was almost certainly the last to have been entered in the book and probably the last to be made on the whole tour.
Skipton Castle began life as a Norman fort built in 1090, but assumed its present grandeur under the Clifford family after 1310. Similar views of Skipton occur in the Yorkshire 2 sketchbook (Tate D11064–D11063; Turner Bequest CXLV 15–14a), which Turner used on the same tour.

David Hill
February 2009

How to cite

David Hill, ‘Skipton Castle from the North 1816 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 2009, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2013, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-skipton-castle-from-the-north-r1143588, accessed 18 April 2024.