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 Dover Castle c.1821-2

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Dover Castle’ c.1821-2
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 23 Verso:
Dover Castle c.1821–2
D17246
Turner Bequest CXCVIII 23a
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 187 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Made across this and the facing page on folio 24 recto (D17247), this drawing describes Dover Castle and its surrounding buildings. Finberg was reluctant to choose between Rochester and Dover, although he too recognised the form of a castle.1
The present page demonstrates some of the peripheral land as it slopes towards and then drops away into ramparts and ditches. The pencil lines are clean and sure, with some brief areas of hatching. For a description of the Castle itself in this sketch, see the entry for the facing page.
For further information about the role of Dover and its Castle in this sketchbook and elsewhere in Turner’s oeuvre, see the entry for folio 24 recto (D17247).

Maud Whatley
January 2016

1
Finberg 1909, I, p.604.

How to cite

Maud Whatley, ‘Dover Castle 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-dover-castle-r1184520, accessed 23 April 2024.