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 ... > Thames Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Inscription by Turner: Financial Calculations ?1825

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Inscription by Turner: Financial Calculations’ ?1825
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 1 Verso:
Inscription by Turner: Financial Calculations ?1825
D18596
Turner Bequest CCXII 1a
Pencil on white wove paper, 118 x 114 mm
Part watermark ‘Al | 18’
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
With the page turned vertically, Turner has written the following calculations and notes at the top:
   5               [?5]
   5         2 | 265
 10               13 – 3       to keep the [?House]
 15               10         Taxs [?In] pounds
   5
3,0                    22 . 5
The sum on the left is presumably in shillings, incorrectly totalling three pounds. The five addends relate to the first five dated payments, probably made in 1825 and signed ‘Ann Wise’, inside the front cover (D40969); they suggest rent paid on one of Turner’s properties in Wapping, East London.1 The uncertain word ‘House’ next to a typically convoluted second calculation would seem to confirm this.

Matthew Imms
December 2014

1
See Nicholas Powell, ‘Finance and Property’ in Evelyn Joll, Martin Butlin and Luke Herrmann (eds.), The Oxford Companion to J.M.W. Turner, Oxford 2001, p.108.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Inscription by Turner: Financial Calculations ?1825 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-inscription-by-turner-financial-calculations-r1172713, accessed 25 April 2024.