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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Tour to the Alps 1836 > Val d'Aosta Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Two Sketches: ?Ham Castle and Town from the South; Massif of Mont Blanc from the Col de Voza 1836

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Two Sketches: ?Ham Castle and Town from the South; Massif of Mont Blanc from the Col de Voza’ 1836
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 8 Recto:
Two Sketches: ?Ham Castle and Town from the South; Massif of Mont Blanc from the Col de Voza 1836
D29046
Turner Bequest CCXCIII 8
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 190 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘[?] Chapel’ centre left and ‘[?]Dark Tower’ centre right
Inscribed, possibly by John Ruskin, in blue ink ‘8’ top right and ‘320’ bottom right
Stamped in brown ‘CCXCIII 8’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The page contains two sketches:
i. (above) ?Ham, from the south, with the castle in the foreground and the Church of Notre Dame in the distance left, with the belfry to the right. The sketch is hard to relate to the site today. The castle and belfry were destroyed in the First World War; the belfry has disappeared entirely and the castle is but a stump. Notre Dame was badly damaged but has been fully restored. Ham lies about ten miles south of Peronne in the Somme area of northern France. Turner’s travelling companion H.A.J Munro said specifically that they visited Ham on their tour in 1836 (see in this catalogue Sketchbooks used on Tour to the Alps, 1836).
ii. (below) The west face of the Mont Blanc massif from near the Col de Voza, with the Aiguille du Midi to the left. The view is continued to the right from the opposite page (D29045; Turner Bequest CCXCIII 7a).
The sketch of ?Ham appears to have been drawn first, as Turner made his way through France between St Omer and Geneva.

David Hill
June 2010

How to cite

David Hill, ‘Two Sketches: ?Ham Castle and Town from the South; Massif of Mont Blanc from the Col de Voza 1836 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, February 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-two-sketches-ham-castle-and-town-from-the-south-massif-of-r1144595, accessed 18 May 2024.