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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Old London Bridge; Architectural Details; a Gothic Window ?1824

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 35 Verso:
Old London Bridge; Architectural Details; a Gothic Window ?1824
D17895
Turner Bequest CCV 35a
Pencil on white wove paper, 98 x 162 mm
Watermark ‘1821’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘5 [...]’, ‘[...]’, ‘8’, ‘A’ and ‘6’ towards top left, ‘9’, ‘7’, ‘[?B...]’ and ‘G Re[...]’ towards top right, and ‘25 Rustic | [?made A]’ towards bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, the main drawing here is effectively a continuation to the left of that on the recto (D17894), an elevation of the east side of Old London Bridge, the section here being that nearest the south bank of the River Thames. There are notes and numbers concerning the stonework, and details above and below including the Gothic tracery of a window, perhaps from a nearby church such as Southwark Cathedral; see also folio 34 verso (D17893). Compare the arches on folio 2 verso (D17837) and the elevation on folios 32 verso–33 recto (D17889–D17890).
Like that on the recto, the present study would have informed the 1824 watercolour known as The Port of London (Victoria and Albert Museum, London),1 engraved in 1827 as Old London Bridge and Vicinity (Tate impression: T06070); see the overall Introduction to the present Thames-related section.
More than half the drawings in this sketchbook show the river around the bridge, and are likely to date from 1824; see the book’s Introduction.

Matthew Imms
December 2014

1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.358 no.514, reproduced.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Old London Bridge; Architectural Details; a Gothic Window ?1824 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, December 2014, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, April 2015, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-old-london-bridge-architectural-details-a-gothic-window-r1172609, accessed 28 March 2024.