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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > First Italian Tour 1819-20 > Passage of the Simplon Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Mountains, near the Simplon Pass 1819

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Mountains, near the Simplon Pass’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 12 Recto:
Mountains, near the Simplon Pass 1819
D16912
Turner Bequest CXCIV 12
Pencil and grey watercolour wash on white wove paper, 121 x 195 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘12’, bottom left, descending left-hand edge
Stamped in black ‘CXCIV 12’ bottom left, descending left-hand edge
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The dark grey watercolour wash covering this sketchbook page makes Turner’s subsequent pencil drawing almost impossible to make out. The view is one of a series documenting the landscape near the Simplon Pass in Switzerland, and the artist has employed small areas scratching-out to delineate the silhouette of the mountains near the top and part of the road in the bottom left-hand corner.
For a general discussion of Turner’s expedition to the Simplon Pass see the introduction to the sketchbook.

Nicola Moorby
April 2011

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Mountains, near the Simplon Pass 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2011, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-mountains-near-the-simplon-pass-r1132787, accessed 17 May 2024.