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

There are two drawings here, one made with the page turned horizontally, apparently showing different aspects of a ruined castle in isolation from its setting. The setting is presumably the Tyrol Alps, travelling east from Sankt Anton am Arlberg (see folio 10 verso opposite; D32282) towards Landeck (see under folio 16 verso; D32294).

Finberg later annotated his 1909 Inventory entry including his reading of Turner’s note (‘Ruins of “Shrofberg (?).”’): ‘?Kronburg, nr Landeck’.1 Burg Kronburg is on a summit three or four miles north-east of Landeck in the direction of Innsbruck, but is more compact than the structure in Turner’s sketches. Burg Schrofenstein, a hillside ruin north of the centre of Landeck, seems more likely given Turner’s inscription, which may indeed be ‘Shrofberg’, but it too appears to be a less extensive building, with a single square tower rising from a relatively small keep. The same ruin may be shown in its mountainous context on folio 15 recto opposite (D32291).

A long sequence of sketches, mostly characterised as ‘Mountains’ by Finberg (with occasional identifications and transcriptions of the place names marked by the artist), lies between folios 7 recto and 76 recto (D32275–D32411).2 See the sketchbook’s Introduction for the likely overall route between Bregenz and Venice.3