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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > The Second Meuse-Moselle Tour 1839 > First Mossel and Oxford Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Marienburg and its Surroundings; The Bridge over the Alf at Alf and Burg Arras; Alf, with its Bridge, Church and Houses 1839

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Marienburg and its Surroundings; The Bridge over the Alf at Alf and Burg Arras; Alf, with its Bridge, Church and Houses’ 1839
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 5 Recto:
The Marienburg and its Surroundings; The Bridge over the Alf at Alf and Burg Arras; Alf, with its Bridge, Church and Houses 1839
D28299
Turner Bequest CCLXXXIX 5
Pencil on white wove drawing paper, 235 x 140 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘Arres’ top left
Inscribed in red ink ‘5’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXXXIX–5’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The first four sketches, from top to rear, depict the Marienburg, a former Augustinian monastery built near the ruins of a Roman fortress in Zell an der Mosel. For other sketches of the Marienburg taken on the 1839 tour see the Trèves to Cochem and Coblenz to Mayence sketchbook (Tate D28378–D28380; Turner Bequest CCXC 14a–15a). Turner also recorded the monastery extensively during his 1824 Meuse- Moselle tour; see the Rivers Meuse and Moselle sketchbook (Tate D19773–D19775, D19779, D19780; Turner Bequest CCXVI 112a–113a, 114a, 115) and the Moselle (or Rhine) sketchbook (Tate D20163, D20164, D20187; Turner Bequest CCXIX 2, 3, 26).
The final views, rendered with abbreviated handling, show the town of Alf situated on the banks of the Alf or Alfbach, a tributary of the Moselle. Alf’s ancient wooden bridge and the spire of St Remigius’s Church are identifiable, as is the medieval Burg Arras in the distance.1 For other views of Alf and Castle Arras see the Trèves to Cochem and Coblenz to Mayence sketchbook (Tate D28372–D28374; Turner Bequest CCXC 11a–12a).

Alice Rylance-Watson
August 2013

1
‘The Castle and its History’, Arras Castle, http://www.arras.de/html/castle.html, accessed 8 August 2013.

How to cite

Alice Rylance-Watson, ‘The Marienburg and its Surroundings; The Bridge over the Alf at Alf and Burg Arras; Alf, with its Bridge, Church and Houses 1839 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-marienburg-and-its-surroundings-the-bridge-over-the-alf-r1150580, accessed 24 April 2024.