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 > Dynevor Castle Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Dunstanburgh Castle: The Eastern Tower, with Figures under the Cliff ?1798

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Dunstanburgh Castle: The Eastern Tower, with Figures under the Cliff’ ?1798
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 82 Verso:
Dunstanburgh Castle: The Eastern Tower, with Figures under the Cliff ?1798
D01599
Turner Bequest XL 80a
Pencil on white wove paper, 135 x 95 mm
Watermark ‘1794 | J Whatman’
Inscribed in red ink ‘13’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘XL – 80 a’ top right, upside down
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, this composition is continued on folio 83 recto opposite (D01600; Turner Bequest XL 81). Unexpectedly, this very summary sketch is a view of part of Dunstanburgh Castle on the coast of Northumberland, which Turner had visited in 1797; see the North of England sketchbook (Tate D00952–D00954; Turner Bequest XXXIV 45, 46, 46a). A more detailed drawing of the same tower (the Lilburn Tower) occurs on folios 84 verso–85 recto of the present book (D01603–D01604; Turner Bequest XL 82a–83).
It has been proposed that Turner returned to the Northumberland coast in 1799 and made these drawings then; but they may have been based on the studies in the North of England book. A further drawing of the Lilburn Tower, with an effect of lightning, occurs in the Wilson sketchbook (Tate D01211–D01212; Turner Bequest XXXVII 94–95).
Drawings of Bamburgh, another castle on the Northumberland coast, occur on folios 86 verso–87 recto and 88 verso–89 recto (D01607–D01608, D01611–D01612; Turner Bequest XL 84a–85, 86a–87).

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Dunstanburgh Castle: The Eastern Tower, with Figures under the Cliff ?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-dunstanburgh-castle-the-eastern-tower-with-figures-under-the-r1173838, accessed 25 April 2024.