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

Turner has rendered the obscure forms of a headland in this drawing through vigorous strokes and layers of wash applied over dry paper, lending parts of it a mottled effect. Daubs of graded blue-grey suggest a body of water, perhaps the sea or Pent Stream, at the right. Turner exploits the textured grain of the paper by using a predominantly dry-brush method; the dark grey-brown pigment in the central register particularly rendered to full, contrastive effect as a result. Above, the form of a building on the headland is rendered hazily in dabs of umber and brown wash. An isolated stretch of sky is punctured by a broad stroke of brown wash – a spontaneous continuation of the colour used in the headland.

Technical notes:

Some of the pigment has offset onto the folio opposite.