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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Tour to the Alps 1836 > Val d'Aosta Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Three Sketches: St Omer, Looking along the Ramparts to the Cathedral of Notre Dame; Arve Valley towards Sallanches from near St Gervais; Alpine Valley with a Man on Horseback 1836

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Three Sketches: St Omer, Looking along the Ramparts to the Cathedral of Notre Dame; Arve Valley towards Sallanches from near St Gervais; Alpine Valley with a Man on Horseback’ 1836
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 1 Recto:
Three Sketches: St Omer, Looking along the Ramparts to the Cathedral of Notre Dame; Arve Valley towards Sallanches from near St Gervais; Alpine Valley with a Man on Horseback 1836
D29032
Turner Bequest CCXCIII 1
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 190 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Walls’, lower right; ‘[?] Chet’, bottom centre, inverted; ‘[?] Salnch’, top right; and ‘[?] 16 St Ger’ below sketch at top right
Inscribed, possibly by John Ruskin, in blue ink ‘1’ top right and ‘320’ bottom right
Stamped in brown ‘CCXCIII 1’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The page contains three sketches:
i. (main sketch) A view at St Omer, looking along the ramparts, towards the west tower of the Cathedral of Notre Dame; inscribed ‘Walls’ below right.
ii. (top right) The Arve Valley looking towards Sallanches from near St Gervais, with the Pointe Percée range to the left, and the Aiguille de Varan to the right; inscribed ‘[?] 16 St Ger’ lower centre and ‘[?] Salnch’ centre.
iii. (below left, inverted, squeezed into a space left within the promenade in the main sketch) a man on horseback facing mountains in an Alpine valley; inscribed ‘[?] Chet’ centre.
The sketch of St Omer appears to have been the first Turner entered in the sketchbook once he decided to work through it in this direction, and is the first of a series at St Omer extending to D29040; Turner Bequest CCXCIII 5. The other two sketches of Alpine valley subjects were clearly squeezed in some haste into the available space at the front of the book. That of St Gervais is the first of a number of the same subject scattered across various pages in this part of the book.

David Hill
June 2010

How to cite

David Hill, ‘Three Sketches: St Omer, Looking along the Ramparts to the Cathedral of Notre Dame; Arve Valley towards Sallanches from near St Gervais; Alpine Valley with a Man on Horseback 1836 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, February 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-three-sketches-st-omer-looking-along-the-ramparts-to-the-r1144581, accessed 25 April 2024.