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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Autumn Tour of Northern France 1845 > Dieppe and Kent Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Folkestone from the Harbour, with the Tower of St Mary and St Eanswythe's Church 1845

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Folkestone from the Harbour, with the Tower of St Mary and St Eanswythe's Church’ 1845
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 5 Verso:
Folkestone from the Harbour, with the Tower of St Mary and St Eanswythe’s Church 1845
D35496
Turner Bequest CCCLXI 5a
Pencil on white wove paper, 86 x 111 mm
Partial watermark ‘ng | 2’
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This rapid sketch is likely to show Folkestone rising above the west end of its harbour, with the tower of the parish church on the right. The background of William Daniell’s 1823 aquatint Folkestone, Kent (Tate impression: T02954) is comparable; see also among Turner’s various previous views there a detailed drawing in the 1810s Richmond Hill; Hastings to Margate sketchbook (Tate D10479; Turner Bequest CXL 36a) and others in the early 1820s Folkestone sketchbook, including Tate D17347 (Turner Bequest CXCVIII 82).
Among Turner’s finished designs there is a watercolour of Fishing Boats on Folkestone Beach, Kent of the late 1820s (National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin),1 and the Ideas of Folkestone sketchbook (Tate; Turner Bequest CCCLVI), contemporary with the present book, focuses on the town, the sea and the nearby coast.
Folio 6 recto opposite (D35497) is a view of a railway viaduct not far from the harbour. See also folios 14 verso–15 recto (D35512, D35514).
1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.403 no.884, reproduced.
Technical notes:
There is some brown staining at the edge, possibly indicating water damage in the 1928 Tate flood.

Matthew Imms
September 2016

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Folkestone from the Harbour, with the Tower of St Mary and St Eanswythe’s Church 1845 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-folkestone-from-the-harbour-with-the-tower-of-st-mary-and-st-r1183921, accessed 22 November 2024.