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 West Front of Würzburg Cathedral; Inscription by Turner: Financial Notes 1840

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  • Inside back cover of sketchbook
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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The West Front of Würzburg Cathedral; Inscription by Turner: Financial Notes’ 1840 (Inside back cover of sketchbook)
Inside back cover of sketchbook
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Inside Back Cover:
The West Front of Würzburg Cathedral; Inscription by Turner: Financial Notes 1840
D41129
Pencil on flecked pale blue laid paper, 104 x 170 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘27 [... | ?3 G...]’ at left, ascending vertically, and ‘[...]’ below centre
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Made with the page turned horizontally, this very slight, loose sketch has been identified by Cecilia Powell as showing Würzburg Cathedral;1 the upper part, extending a little upwards onto folio 90 verso opposite (D41130) seems to indicate the twin towers flanking the gable end of the nave on the west front. For the extensive sequence of Würzburg views in this sketchbook and others elsewhere, see under folio 72 verso (D30596; Turner Bequest CCCIII 71).
The rest of the somewhat incoherent pencil work and the apparent inscription below are difficult to make out. At right-angles to the left, inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, are brief scrawled notes including figures, probably of an ad hoc financial nature.
1
See Powell 1995, p.244.
Technical notes:
This is the rear paste-down, with some brown spotting from the glue securing it to the cover.

Matthew Imms
September 2018

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The West Front of Würzburg Cathedral; Inscription by Turner: Financial Notes 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-west-front-of-wurzburg-cathedral-inscription-by-turner-r1196390, accessed 19 April 2024.