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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner The River Tay, with Wooded Hills, at Dunkeld 1801

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 118 Recto:
The River Tay, with Wooded Hills, at Dunkeld 1801
D03140
Turner Bequest LVI 116
Pencil on white wove paper, 184 x 114 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Dunkeld’ bottom right
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram bottom right
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘116’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘LVI – 116’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This is a continuation of the subject on folio 117 verso opposite (D03139; Turner Bequest LVI 115a). The principal sequence of drawings at Dunkeld occurs on folios 127 verso–133 recto (D03159–D03169; Turner Bequest LVI 125a–131); five subsequent openings, folios 135 verso–140 recto (D03173–D03182; Turner Bequest LVI 133a–138), are annotated ‘near Dunkeld’ and show the Hermitage and Rumbling Bridge.
This drawing and that on folio 116 verso (D03137; Turner Bequest LVI 114a) may have been drawn on pages inadvertently left blank. It is unlikely that Turner, having traversed Glen Errochty to reach Blair Atholl, would have made the long detour south to Dunkeld before polishing off his more northerly objective. This landscape may be a stretch of Tay to the west of Dunkeld, with the crag of Craigie Barns rising to the right; see under folio 116 recto (D03136; Turner Bequest LVI 114).

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘The River Tay, with Wooded Hills, at Dunkeld 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-the-river-tay-with-wooded-hills-at-dunkeld-r1179335, accessed 29 March 2024.