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

There appear to be six rapid sketches here, made with the page turned vertically. At the top left is Holy Trinity Church, Camp Hill, Bordesley, south-east of Birmingham, also the focus of the single sketch on the verso (D22025). Here the east end is shown from the north-east, the viewpoint being in the vicinity of the Warwick and Birmingham Canal (now part of Grand Union Canal); there is a more developed view from this direction in the contemporary Birmingham and Coventry sketchbook (Tate D22393; Turner Bequest CCXL 38). At the top right appears to be a small separate sketch of a building and trees, annotated ‘w’, possibly to indicate water. The slightly incoherent sketch immediately below, perhaps labelled ‘Bordesley’, shows buildings and less legible features.

The rest of the page is occupied by three loose sketches dominated by the outline of Kenilworth Castle, seen in the first two from the east, with Leicester’s Building and the Great Tower to the left and right on the skyline above Lunn’s Tower and Leicester’s Gatehouse. The castle is now screened by trees on this side. The bottom view appears to be from the south-east, with Leicester’s Building on the right and the Saintlowe Tower on the left. There is a last sketch in this sequence on folio 26 verso opposite (D22023).

Further views of Kenilworth run between folios 28 recto and 37 verso (D22026–D22045). For the history of the castle and Turner’s subsequent watercolour, see under folio 29 recto (D22028).