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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Wales 1798 > Cyfarthfa Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Shipping at the Mouth of the Wye; the Ruins of a Chapel on an Islet Beyond 1798

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Shipping at the Mouth of the Wye; the Ruins of a Chapel on an Islet Beyond’ 1798
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Shipping at the Mouth of the Wye; the Ruins of a Chapel on an Islet Beyond 1798
D01661
Turner Bequest XLI 28a
Pencil and wash on white wove paper, 290 x 455 mm
Blind-stamped in the drawing with Turner Bequest monogram
Inscribed in pencil ‘28a’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘XLI – 28a’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner had been interested in the islet with its ruin on his first crossing of the Severn in 1791; he drew it in his Bristol and Malmesbury sketchbook (Tate D00076, D00080; Turner Bequest VI 5, 7a). Other drawings in the present book that show the islet with its ruined chapel are D01651 and D01652 (Turner Bequest XLI 20, 21). The islet is situated at the mouth of the Wye, and this suggests that some of the scenes of shipping on a river (D01657–D01659, D01662; Turner Bequest 26, 26a, 27, 29) may show the Wye rather than the Avon Gorge. Finberg considered them to be scenes on the Usk, not the Severn.1
1
Finberg 1910, p.44.
Technical notes:
The sheet and its grey and brown washes are discoloured from exposure.
Verso:
Blank; stamped in brown ink with Turner Bequest monogram.

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Shipping at the Mouth of the Wye; the Ruins of a Chapel on an Islet Beyond 1798 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2013, 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-shipping-at-the-mouth-of-the-wye-the-ruins-of-a-chapel-on-an-r1173277, accessed 24 April 2024.