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

This is a pencil and watercolour composition on a medium to heavy weight, grey coloured wove paper. There is no watermark. The quickly executed pencil underdrawing was applied first and then the paint layers were added. In this picture the colour of the paper has been used to great effect. Most of the foreground is only in pencil and has little or no paint application. The rest of the picture, with the exception of the sky, is lightly executed in watery washes. In contrast the sky has a thicker paint application. An underbound white gouache has been applied first, followed by a layer of watery but pigment rich yellow watercolour. An underbound black gouache has been used at both edges of the composition to add lowlights.

The contrast between the areas of minimal media application and those of intense, heavy colour creates the dramatic effect in this image. This work is in quite good condition with the colours retaining much of their vibrancy.

Identifying its subject in relation to other views of Regensburg in southern Germany, Cecilia Powell described this as ‘a very swift coloured drawing taken from Turner’s hotel, the Drei Helmen, and recording a brilliant yellow sky which evidently reminded him of those of Aelbert Cuyp for it is inscribed “Cyp”’.1 By comparison with a more considered pencil study in the contemporary Venice, Passau to Würzburg sketchbook (Tate D31357; Turner Bequest CCCX 41a), the view is from the north-east, with the Neupfarrkirche on the left in the middle of Neupfarrplatz, with the spire of the nearby Goldener Turm on the right, as can still be seen from the roof terrace of a department store on the site.

The scene is also depicted in a nocturnal watercolour lit by tongues of yellow fire encroaching at the left-hand edge, known until recently as ‘A conflagration, Lausanne’ (Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester).2 Ian Warrell has noted that the same local newspaper of 14 September 1840 recording Turner’s stay in the city3 also contained an account of a nearby fire in the early hours of the previous day, suggesting that the artist was either already at the hotel to see it or heard of it very soon afterwards.4 For further discussion of the fire subject in relation to other Regensburg watercolours on white paper, see under D31357 and the Introduction to the Venice, Passau to Würzburg book; its other pencil studies around the city are listed under Tate D31311 (Turner Bequest CCCX 18a).

Although the flame-like effect here, heightened by contrast with the cool grey of the paper, might give the impression of another blaze, it appears to be a straightforward impression of the sun setting over the west end of the square, dashed in over a hastily rendered pencil sketch of the surroundings. The otherwise unremarkable event, so frequently depicted by Turner, on this occasion reminded him of golden effects in the work of one of his important influences, the seventeenth-century landscape painter Aelbert Cuyp; similar annotations appear more predictably in his Dutch sketchbooks of 1817 and 1825 and elsewhere.5 He seems to have been in a particularly reflective mood around this time, as notes on nearby sketches in the Venice, Passau to Würzburg book refer to Cuyp’s contemporary, Claude Lorrain (Tate D31347; Turner Bequest CCCX 36a), and to Turner’s own late counterpart, Thomas Girtin (D31410; CCCX 68).

Originally described as a generic ‘View of town, with yellow sky’,6 this sheet had nevertheless been included in the ‘Venice: Miscellaneous. (b) Grey Paper’ section of Finberg’s 1909 Inventory, albeit among a handful (Tate D32185–D32191; Turner Bequest CCCXVII 6–12) of which he noted ‘some – probably all ... are not Venetian subjects’, but likely ‘done at the same time, and may therefore help to throw light on Turner’s movements.’7 In 1930 he noted that ‘some ... may have been made in the Tyrol on the way to or from Venice’.8 Other than D32189, a view of Bolzano (Bozen) from the outward leg, and D32191, which may show the Venetian Lagoon, they have all since been identified as German subjects from 1840’s return journey, and are included in this subsection.

As discussed in the technical notes below, the present study is one of seven of Regensburg and the nearby Walhalla at Donaustauf (see also Tate D34081, D34084–D34085, D34093, D36150, D36153; Turner Bequest CCCXLI 360, 363, 364, 371, CCCLXIV 293, 296) which were initially eighths of a single sheet; D36151 (CCCLXIV 294) is a related view on similar paper.

Technical notes:

The spontaneous execution combines vigorous pencil (including diagonal hatching, unusual in Turner’s work) and localised colour, with the sky animated by thick strokes of white gouache mixed with the yellow watercolour used sparingly elsewhere to emphasise aspects of the architecture, largely leaving the bare grey paper to suggest the gathering shade in the square. There is a little black gouache for additional contrast at the outer edges; finger prints are evident within the strokes at the left. (See also Helen Evans’s separate technical entry.)

Among many such works on the blue or grey papers customarily used by Turner, this is one of seven originally from a single piece (subsequently scattered through Finberg’s 1909 Inventory, as listed above) to be identified by Cecilia Powell as showing subjects in and around Regensburg.1 They are from an 1829 sheet of the grey Bally, Ellen and Steart paper often used in 1840 (see the Introduction to the overall tour), and were temporarily reassembled for paper conservator Peter Bower’s 1999 Turner’s Later Papers exhibition, showing that their slightly irregular edges match exactly.2

Four subjects were drawn on one side, and three on the other, only one face of each eighth being used, with a last section unaccounted for. Bower has noted Turner’s habit of tearing such sheets, sometimes in advance or sometimes after making a sequence of sketches, unfolding and refolding the intact sheet as necessary.3 The delicate white chalk highlights on several, and the lively gouache and watercolour on three (noted in individual entries), was likely added once the sheets were separated, as suggested particularly by the colour having been freely worked up to the torn edges, with no sign of overlapping brushwork or adventitious splashes across originally neighbouring areas.

Verso:

Blank (closed mount); stamped in black with Turner Bequest monogram over ‘CCCXVII – 6’ towards bottom right; inscribed in pencil ‘CCCXVII. 6.’ towards bottom right.1