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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Folkestone and the Medway c.1821-2 > Folkestone Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Coastal Cliffs, Probably between Folkestone and Dover c.1821-2

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Coastal Cliffs, Probably between Folkestone and Dover’ c.1821-2
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 23 Recto:
Coastal Cliffs, Probably between Folkestone and Dover c.1821–2
D17245
Turner Bequest CXCVIII 23
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 187 mm
Stamped in black ‘CXCVIII – 23’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Judging from the themes and locations explored by Turner in the surrounding pages, this is the final page in a run of drawings, between folio 20 verso and the current page, which describe points along the cliffs between Folkestone and Dover (see D17240, D17241, D17242, D17244). Finberg recognised the topographical form but did not offer any suggestion of specific location.1
The whole page is taken up with the dramatic, sharply rendered chunks of the craggy cliff face, which meet their crowning turf with a fuzzy scribble. On the left hand side, as the subject recedes into the distance, a point at which the headland extends out into the water is clear, and beyond that a single, brief line indicates more land in the distance.

Maud Whatley
January 2016

1
Finberg 1909, I, p.604.

How to cite

Maud Whatley, ‘Coastal Cliffs, Probably between Folkestone and Dover c.1821–2 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, January 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, February 2017, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-coastal-cliffs-probably-between-folkestone-and-dover-r1184519, accessed 25 April 2024.