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

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Joseph Mallord William Turner Five Studies of a Man Digging and a Kneeling Woman 1792

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Five Studies of a Man Digging and a Kneeling Woman’ 1792
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Five Studies of a Man Digging and a Kneeling Woman 1792
D00194
Turner Bequest XVII S
Pencil on white laid card, 123 x 79 mm
Inscribed in red ink ‘XVII S’ top right, ascending vertically
Stamped in black ‘XVII S’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
As the quotation on the verso from Robert Blair’s The Grave on the verso (D40232) makes clear, Turner had in mind an illustration of that poem, rather as his wash composition of Don Quixote illustrated Cervantes’ novel, in the spirit of Loutherbourg’s illustrative drawings; see Tate D00189 (Turner Bequest XVII N).

Andrew Wilton
April 2012

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Five Studies of a Man Digging and a Kneeling Woman 1792 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2012, 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-five-studies-of-a-man-digging-and-a-kneeling-woman-r1140322, accessed 23 November 2024.