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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Studies at ‘The Limes’, Mortlake ?1826

Turner Bequest CCLXIII a 1–3, CCCXLI 299
This subsection comprises four slight pencil studies for two related paintings: The Seat of William Moffatt Esq., at Mortlake. Early (Summer’s) Morning, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1826 (Frick Collection, New York);1 and Mortlake Terrace, the Seat of William Moffatt, Esq. Summer’s Evening, shown at the same venue the following year (National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC).2 They appear to be supplementary or complementary to the studies in the Mortlake and Pulborough sketchbook (Tate; Turner Bequest CCXIII), apparently made at Mortlake, beside the River Thames up-river from central London, in 1825.
D34018 is watermarked ‘1826’, and since these four sketches are consistent in style and format, and relate to both the 1826 and 1827 paintings, they are likely to have been made together on a return visit to Mortlake some time early in 1826, before Early (Summer’s) Morning was completed.
1
Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, pp.144–5 no.235, pl.236 (colour).
2
Ibid., pp.147–8 no.239, pl.237 (colour).

Matthew Imms
December 2014

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How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Studies at ‘The Limes’, Mortlake ?1826’, subset, 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/studies-at-the-limes-mortlake-r1173004, accessed 29 March 2024.