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

Engraved:
(see main catalogue text)

The Mewstone, Mew Stone or Great Mew Stone stands in Wembury Bay, Devon, on the south-eastern approach to Plymouth Sound. Turner sketched it from land and sea in the Plymouth, Hamoaze sketchbook (Tate D09275–7, D09279, D09448, D09450, D09452, D09454, D09458, D09460, D09462; Turner Bequest CXXXI 53, 54, 55, 57, 172a, 173a, 174a, 175a, 177a, 178a, 179a) on his visit to Devon in 1813. A watercolour of about 1814 (National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin),1 showing the rock in stormy seas, was engraved in 1816 as The Mew Stone, at the Entrance of Plymouth Sound, Devonshire for the Picturesque Views on the Southern Coast of England (Tate impressions: T04383–T04385, T05392, T05393, T05970). A vigorous watercolour traditionally known as Storm off Margate (private collection)2 has been identified as another view.3

The present design has been described as a ‘modification’ of the Southern Coast composition, ‘specifically related’4 to the corresponding ‘Little Liber’ mezzotint. Alternatively, it has been treated by Finberg and others as a ‘colour beginning’ for the Dublin watercolour – that is, as a preparatory study rather than a development from it.5 Although the sheet is watermarked 1810, such loose ‘colour beginnings’ for completed watercolours tend to be associated with a rather later phase of Turner’s development, and stylistically the work seems compatible with the other ‘Little Liber’ studies gathered together in the present catalogue and dated by general consensus to the middle of the 1820s.

The composition was engraved in mezzotint,6 traditionally ascribed to Turner himself (see the ‘Little Liber’ introduction). There is no indication in the standard sources as to whether the copper or steel plate was one of those found in his studio after his death (again, see the Introduction), and there is only one proof impression known (British Museum, London); it is described by Rawlinson, who rather vaguely mentions ‘several sketches in the National Gallery’, while Dupret notes that the present watercolour is ‘particularly close to the print’.7

Gillian Forrester has compared the subject and technique of the late, unpublished Liber Studiorum design Moonlight on the Medway (Tate D25451; Turner Bequest CCLXIII 328; see catalogue entry for full details) which she dates to about 1824, with this and other ‘Little Liber’ designs.8

Technical notes:

The edges are all slightly irregular, with top edge cut freehand. The paint is thickly worked, and Andrew Wilton has suggested the unconfirmed presence of ‘some body-colour’.1

Verso:

Blank save for various adventitious splashes of watercolour. The corners are abraded from having previously been glued down.