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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner

Joseph Mallord William Turner Study of a Sunrise or Sunset c.1830

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Study of a Sunrise or Sunset’ c.1830
Folio 27 Recto:
Study of a Sunrise or Sunset c.1830
D22828
Turner Bequest CCXLV 27
Pen and ink on white wove paper, 68 x 110 mm
Inscribed in ink by Turner (see main catalogue entry)
Inscribed in red ink ‘27’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCXLV – 27’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This study, the only pen and ink drawing in the present sketchbook, records a sunrise or sunset. As Gerald Wilkinson has observed, it ‘shows the Turner we learn to love from the from the sketchbooks, coping somehow without his paints in the face of a blinding glory’.1
Turner has inscribed the design with the array of colours and effects he observed in the moment, including, from left to right, ‘Grey | Livid Red | Yellow’, ‘Gold, G[ol]d[e]n’ and possibly ‘Cold’.
1
Wilkinson 1975, p.62.
Verso:
Blank

Hayley Flynn
August 2025

How to cite

Hayley Flynn, ‘Study of a Sunrise or Sunset c.1830’, catalogue entry, August 2025, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, June 2026, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/study-of-a-sunrise-or-sunset-r1212759, accessed 31 July 2026.