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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Venice, Austria and Southern Germany ... > Würzburg, Rhine and Ostend Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Drachenfels, Looking up the River Rhine to Rolandseck 1840

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Drachenfels, Looking up the River Rhine to Rolandseck’ 1840
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 23 Recto:
The Drachenfels, Looking up the River Rhine to Rolandseck 1840
D30500
Turner Bequest CCCIII 22
Pencil on flecked pale blue laid paper, 104 x 170 mm
Partial watermark (countermark): indecipherable maker’s name
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘22’ top right, ascending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCCIII – 22’ top right, ascending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The drawing was made with the page turned horizontally. As identified by Cecilia Powell,1 it shows the Drachenfels hill beyond small beached boats on the east bank of the Rhine, topped by the ruins of Burg Drachenfels, looking up south up the River Rhine to the ruins of Burg Rolandseck in the distance on the right.
Powell has noted that Turner neared the end of this tour following ‘the familiar route of the Rhine between Mainz and Cologne. He almost certainly travelled by steamer, ... sketching most of the well-known sights perfunctorily as he passed.’2 Given that this sketchbook was used in reverse of its subsequent foliation, she has specified the overall range of this phase as ‘TB CCCIII 68v–20v; 11r’,3 indicating folios 12 recto and 21 verso–69 verso (D30479, D30497–D30592; Turner Bequest CCCIII 20a–68a); see this book’s Introduction for the full itinerary of this part of the journey.
The Drachenfels is also shown on folios 23 verso–28 recto and 29 verso (D30501–D30510, D30513; CCCIII 22a–27, 28a). For other views, see the 1817 Itinerary Rhine Tour, Waterloo and Rhine and Rhine sketchbooks (respectively Tate D12663, D12680; Turner Bequest CLIX 83a, 92; D12756–D12757, D12760–D12763, D12768–D12775, D12860, D12862–D12864, D12866–D12867; CLX 29a, 30, 31a–33, 35a–39, 81a, 82a–83a, 84a, 85; D12885, D12887; CLXI 2, 3), the 1824 Rivers Meuse and Moselle sketchbook (D19840; CCXVI 145), the 1833 Brussels up to Mannheim – Rhine sketchbook (D29632, D29663, D29681, D29684–D29685, D29715; CCXCVI 18a, 34, 44, 45a, 46, 61a), the 1835 Prague, Nuremberg, Frankfurt and Rhine sketchbook (D30642–D30643, D30680, D30682, D30769, D30791; CCCIV 6a, 7, 27, 28, 73, 84a), the 1839 Cochem to Coblenz – Home sketchbook (D28615–D28617, D28621–D28623, D28625–D28626; CCXCI 40a–41a, 43a–44a, 45a, 46), and the 1844 Ostend, Rhine and Berne sketchbook (D41449; CCCXXVII 27). There are also two undated pencil studies on separate sheets (D34367, D34374; CCCXLIV 24, 31).
It features in three 1817 watercolours: Rolandswerth Nunnery and Drachenfels (private collection);4 The Drachenfels (Courtauld Gallery, London);5 and Drachenfels from the Rhine (Iris & B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts, Stanford University).6 The 1830 watercolour The Drachenfels (Manchester Art Gallery)7 was engraved for Byron’s Works in 1833 (Tate impression: T06180).
Rolandseck also appears on folios 25 verso–28 recto and 29 verso (D30505–D30510, D30513; CCCIII 24a–27, 28a). See also the Itinerary Rhine Tour, Waterloo and Rhine and Rhine books (D12572; CLIX 30a; D12774–D12775, D12863, D12866–D12868; CLX 38a, 39, 83, 84a–85a; D12885, D12887; CLXI 2, 3), Rivers Meuse and Moselle (D19840; CCXVI 145), Brussels up to Mannheim – Rhine (D29663, D29715; CCXCVI 34, 61a), the Rotterdam and Rhine sketchbook of about 1833 (D32573–D32574; CCCXXII 17a, 18), Prague, Nuremberg, Frankfurt and Rhine (D30769; CCCIV 73), Cochem to Coblenz – Home (D28617, D28621–D28623; CCXCI 41a, 43a–44a), and Ostend, Rhine and Berne (D33050–D33071; CCCXXVII 7a, 18). A watercolour vignette of about 1835, The Brave Roland (National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh),8 was engraved in 1837 as ‘Rolandseck’ for Campbell’s Poetical Works (Tate impression: T04779).
See also Tate D33907 and D33911 (Turner Bequest CCCXLI 202, 206), sheets of multiple views of Burg Rolandseck, Nonnenwerth and the Drachenfels, among the Rhine studies on grey paper likely drawn as Turner passed upriver on the outward leg of the present tour. The sequence also includes separate studies of the Drachenfels and its ruins (D33901–D33902, D33912; CCCXLI 196, 197, 207) and Burg Rolandseck (D33908; CCCXLI 203).

Matthew Imms
September 2018

1
Powell 1995, p.246.
2
Ibid., p.72.
3
Ibid., p.82 note 70.
4
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.377 no.666, reproduced.
5
Ibid., p.377 no.667, reproduced.
6
Ibid., p.378 no.675, reproduced.
7
Ibid., p.445 no.1216, reproduced.
8
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.454 no.1285, as ‘Rolandseck’, reproduced.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The Drachenfels, Looking up the River Rhine to Rolandseck 1840 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2018, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2019, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-drachenfels-looking-up-the-river-rhine-to-rolandseck-r1196258, accessed 26 April 2024.