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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Scotland 1801-10 > Scotch Lakes Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A Valley with Trees in the left Foreground and Distant Mountains 1801

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Valley with Trees in the left Foreground and Distant Mountains’ 1801
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 83 Verso:
A Valley with Trees in the left Foreground and Distant Mountains 1801
D03073
Turner Bequest LVI 81a
Pencil on white wove paper, 184 x 114 mm
Partial watermark ‘mott | 97’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Ben Lower’ (?or ‘Lawers’) bottom left
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The subject is continued on folio 84 recto opposite (D03074; Turner Bequest LVI 82). The surrounding pages suggest that this is a scene in Glen Dochart. The inscription does not seem to read, as Finberg thought,1 ‘Ben Moor’. If the mountain referred to is indeed Ben Lawers, we are looking north-east over Killin towards the western end of Loch Tay, which is dominated by that peak. However, there is a possibility that, however it reads, the inscription does not refer to the mountain visible at the right of the view, which bears little resemblance to either Ben More or Ben Lawers.
An inscription in a similar style is on folio 116 verso (D03137; Turner Bequest LVI 114a). Both have the appearance of having been added at the time the drawings were made rather than (as with the majority in this sketchbook) at a later date.

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

1
See Finberg 1909, I, p.146.

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘A Valley with Trees in the left Foreground and Distant Mountains 1801 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 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-a-valley-with-trees-in-the-left-foreground-and-distant-r1179268, accessed 20 September 2024.