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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Scotland 1834 > Stirling and Edinburgh Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Bothwell Castle from the South-West 1834

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Bothwell Castle from the South-West’ 1834
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 28 Recto:
Bothwell Castle from the South-West 1834
D26313
Turner Bequest CCLXIX 28
Pencil on off-white wove paper, 113 x 190 mm
Inscribed in blue ink by John Ruskin ‘28’ top right and ‘340’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIX 28’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Bothwell Castle is seen here from a low viewpoint near the castle to the south-west. Looking up to the bluff on which the castle stands from the riverbank of the Clyde, the sketch shows the south-east tower at the right and the south-west tower at the left. Having run out of space at the left of the page Turner continued the sketch below, drawing the donjon at the west end of castle at the bottom left of the page (see folio 27; D26311 for a comparative study of this part of the castle). For further sketches of the castle, see folio 26 (D26309).
The present view is very similar to the one chosen by Paul Sandby for his watercolour, Bothwell Castle on the Clyde, 1761 (watercolour and gouache, Laurence Oxley, Hampshire). An engraving of the watercolour by R Godfrey was published in 1773.1

Thomas Ardill
October 2010

1
Reproduced in ‘Bothwell Castle’, Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland, accessed 8 October 2010, < http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/en/site/44889/details/bothwell+castle+avenue+bothwell+castle/>.

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Bothwell Castle from the South-West 1834 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, October 2010, 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-bothwell-castle-from-the-south-west-r1136243, accessed 01 July 2024.