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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Italy c.1828-43 > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Figures and Animals above a Ravine, Perhaps in the North of Italy c.1828-43

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Figures and Animals above a Ravine, Perhaps in the North of Italy’ c.1828-43
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Figures and Animals above a Ravine, Perhaps in the North of Italy c.1828–43
D36233
Turner Bequest CCCLXIV 371
Gouache, pencil and watercolour on buff wove paper, 142 x 188 mm
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCCLXIV – 371’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The subject, apparently figures and animals travelling high above a rocky valley, is unidentified, but may be a northern Italian scene; see the Introduction to this section for further brief discussion and dating. Finberg’s tentative 1909 Inventory title was ‘Ravine, North Italy (?)’,1 although how he arrived at an Italian identification is unclear; he may have adopted an existing title from a checklist of the ongoing Fifth Loan Collection from the Turner Bequest, which did not have a printed catalogue.
The extensive, swift pencil work suggests a direct sketch, worked up in colour subsequently. A careful horizontal stroke of white towards the top right evokes the glint of light on distant water.
1
See Finberg 1909, II, p.1206.
Technical notes:
The paper has darkened within the area not formerly protected by a mount while on prolonged display.
Verso:
Blank

Matthew Imms
July 2015

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Figures and Animals above a Ravine, Perhaps in the North of Italy c.1828–43 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, July 2015, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-figures-and-animals-above-a-ravine-perhaps-in-the-north-of-r1183046, accessed 25 April 2024.