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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Thames, London and South of England 1821 ... > Old London Bridge Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A Cloudy Sky, ?with a Sunset c.1823-4

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Cloudy Sky, ?with a Sunset’ c.1823-4
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 39 Recto:
A Cloudy Sky, ?with a Sunset c.1823–4
D17901
Turner Bequest CCV 39
Watercolour on white wove paper, 98 x 162 mm
Watermark ‘1821’
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘39’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCV – 39’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This is the last of a sequence of fourteen monochrome, tonal studies of landscapes and cloudy skies running from about the middle of the sketchbook onwards; for the others and further discussion, see the Introduction. The present work is perhaps the most improvisational and unresolved in its energetic vortex of pigment, worked with extremes of wet and dry handling around the rough, blank central disk of the sun. Vertical strokes to its left evoke tall trees, but otherwise there are no clear markers in this composition, more evocative of a magnetic field than a conventional landscape.

Matthew Imms
December 2014

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘A Cloudy Sky, ?with a Sunset c.1823–4 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-a-cloudy-sky-with-a-sunset-r1172615, accessed 19 April 2024.