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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Wales and Isle of Wight 1795-1800 > South Wales Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Inscriptions by Turner: A List of Commissions c.1795

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Inscriptions by Turner: A List of Commissions’ c.1795
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Second Flyleaf, Verso:
Inscriptions by Turner: A List of Commissions c.1795
D40557
Pen and brown ink and pencil on white wove paper, 264 x 203 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pen and brown ink and pencil with subjects and names (see main catalogue entry)
Stamped in brown ink with Turner Bequest monogram bottom left
Most of this list, taking up over half the page, is in pen and ink; Turner’s ‘X’ pencil annotations are indicated in italics. The last four lines are entirely in pencil:
                         Order’d               Drawings 
 
X  Landaff Cathedral          } Dr Mathews Hereford Size of sketch 4.2 [?‘by’ overwritten]  
   Fishermans Cottage         } 
X  Cascade <Hampton> 
X  Oak                        } 
X  Chaple     13. 17          }   Lord Viscount Malden Hampton Court 
X  N. Front                   } 
X   
X  S Front                    } 
X Walls of Tenby – Size of the Sketch Mr Landseer 
   Brecknock Castle           } 
   Ross                       } 
   Ross Market House          }   Mr Lambirt – size of the Sketches 
   Walls of Tenby             } 
   St Davids Pallace          } 
   Landowrow Mill             } M r Laurie 
+ Aberdillias Mill –     Mr Mitchell – size of Landilio Bridge 
   Newport Castle         Mr Kershaw 
   N Front of Hampton Court     }   Sr Richard Hoare 
   S F                          } 
For ‘L[l]andaff’, see the drawings on folios 4 recto and 5 recto (D00556, D00557). A watercolour view of Llandaff Cathedral based on the first of these is Tate D00686 (Turner Bequest XXVIII A);1 it was shown at the Royal Academy in 1796. For a ‘Fisherman’s Cottage’, see Tate D00704 (Turner Bequest XXVIII S). Dr Matthews of Hereford was evidently the commissioner of a watercolour of this subject.
Turner sketched Viscount Malden’s seat at ‘Hampton Court’, near Leominster, Hereford, on this tour: folios 48 recto, 49 recto, 50 recto and 51 recto (Tate D00603–D00606; Turner Bequest XXVI 49, 50, 51, 52) show an oak tree in the grounds, the cascade, the house from the south east, and the Chapel; folio 52 recto (D00607; Turner Bequest XXVI 53) shows the north front. The house was to be a goal again on his 1798 tour, when he was commissioned by Sir Richard Colt Hoare to make drawings of it. See the Hereford Court sketchbook (Tate D01320, D01321; Turner Bequest XXXVIII 66, 67).
For ‘Brecknock’ (Brecon) Castle see folio 83 recto (D00653; Turner Bequest XXVI 91). See the drawings of ‘Ross’(-on-Wye) on folio 53 recto (D00608; Turner Bequest XXVI 54). Ross Market Place is on folio 54 recto (D00609; Turner Bequest XXVI 55) and Ross Market Hall on folio 65 recto (D00621; Turner Bequest XXVI 67); one or the other was commissioned by ‘Mr Lambirt’.
There is a drawing of White’s House in the ‘Walls of Tenby’ on folio 24 recto (D00576; Turner Bequest XXVI 23). See folio 24 recto (D00576; Turner Bequest XXVI 23) for a note on the engraver John Landseer. There are drawings at ‘St Davids’ on folios 35 recto, 36 recto, 37 recto, 40 recto and 41 recto (D00588–D00590, D00593, D00594; Turner Bequest XXVI 35, 36, 37, 39, 40).
‘L[l]andowror Mill’ is the subject of a drawing on folio 39 recto (D00592; Turner Bequest XXVI 38). ‘Aberdillias’ (Aberdulais) appears on folios 9 recto, 10 recto, 11 recto and possibly 12 recto (D00561–D00564); a finished watercolour of Aberdulais Mill is at the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth.2 For ‘Newport Castle’, see the drawing on folio 3 recto (D00555).
Sir Richard Colt Hoare (1758–1838) of Stourhead in Wiltshire was already, it seems, an active patron of Turner, and as a result of this tour the artist made a series of views of Hampton Court, based on the drawings noted above.
Compare the format of the list at the front of the Isle of Wight sketchbook (Tate D41250; Turner Bequest XXIV [recto of flyleaf]).

Andrew Wilton
April 2012

1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.315 no.143, pl.24.
2
Ibid., p.489 no.169a, reproduced.

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Inscriptions by Turner: A List of Commissions c.1795 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-inscriptions-by-turner-a-list-of-commissions-r1140879, accessed 21 November 2024.