Joseph Mallord William Turner Oxford from North Hinksey c.1837-9
Joseph Mallord William Turner,
Oxford from North Hinksey
c.1837-9
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Oxford from North Hinksey c.1837–9
D25220
Turner Bequest CCLXIII 98
Turner Bequest CCLXIII 98
Watercolour on white wove paper, 347 x 505 mm
Inscribed in red ink ‘98’ bottom right
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram towards bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIII – 98’ bottom right
Inscribed in red ink ‘98’ bottom right
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram towards bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIII – 98’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Exhibition history
1935
Drawings and Sketches by J.M.W. Turner, National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, December 1935–April 1936 (46, as ‘A sunny landscape’).
1937
Display of Watercolours from the Turner Bequest, Tate Gallery, London, December 1937–September 1939; continuing after the Second World War–December 1952 (no catalogue but frame number II: 25, as ‘Landscape’).
1958
Eight Centuries of Landscape and Natural History in European Water-colour 1180 – 1920, Department of Prints and Drawings, British Museum, London, April 1958 (63, as ‘View at Sunset’).
1983
J.M.W. Turner: Studies for Finished Watercolours (c.1825–40): Watercolours from the Turner Bequest, Loaned by the British Museum, Tate Gallery, London, January–June 1983 (no catalogue, as ‘A sunny landscape’).
1997
Turner’s Watercolour Explorations 1810–1842, Tate Gallery, London, February–June 1997, Southampton City Art Gallery, June–September 1997 (80, reproduced in colour, as ‘Oxford from North Hinksey’, c.1837–40).
2000
Turner’s Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, June–September 2000 (65, reproduced in colour, as ‘Oxford from North Hinksey: Colour Beginning’, ?c.1839).
2013
Turner from the Tate: The Making of a Master, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, February–May 2013, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, June–September 2013 (74, reproduced in colour, as ‘Oxford from North Hinksey’, c.1837–40).
References
1909
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.II, p.821, CCLXIII 98, as ‘A sunny landscape’. c.1820–30.
1997
David Hill, ‘Turner’s “Colour Beginnings” in Britain’, Turner Society News, no.76, August 1997, p.7.
1997
Eric Shanes, Turner’s Watercolour Explorations 1810–1842, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1997, pp.13, 19, 86, 87 no.80, reproduced in colour, as ‘Oxford from North Hinksey’. c.1837–40, p.96 Appendix I under ‘England and Wales Series’, as ‘Sketch for a variant view of Oxford from North Hinksey’. c.1837–40, p.100 under ‘Oxford’, as ‘Sketch for an England and Wales series variant view of Oxford from North Hinksey’. c.1837–40, p.105 Appendix II, as ‘Sketch: Oxford from North Hinksey’.
2000
Colin Harrison, Turner’s Oxford, exhibition catalogue, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford 2000, pp.93, 106 no.65, as ‘Oxford from North Hinksey: Colour Beginning’. ?c.1839, pl.30 (colour).
This loose colour study has been related by Eric Shanes to the watercolour (Manchester Art Gallery)1 commissioned by the Oxford printseller James Ryman and engraved in 1841 as Oxford from North Hinksey.2 Shanes suggests this is a variation of that composition, perhaps intended as an undeveloped subject for Turner’s Picturesque Views in England and Wales,3 the last engravings of which were issued in 1838. He notes the source material as various panoramic sketches towards the back (as now foliated) of the First Mossel and Oxford sketchbook, from Tate D28331 (Turner Bequest CCLXXXIX 21) onwards.4 Cecilia Powell has dated the continental sketches in the book to 1839, but observes that the ‘Oxford ones ... clearly predate them’.5
Without discussing or identifying the present work, Anne Lyles has proposed that at least three of Turner’s loose colour studies of the view west along Oxford’s High Street (Tate D25125, D25126, D25127, D25228, D25485; Turner Bequest CCLXIII 3, 4, 5, 106, 362) might have been intended for a central Oxford counterpoint to the finished watercolour.6 Eric Shanes suggests instead that the present ‘colour beginning’, others of Oxford college gardens (Tate D25217, D25218, D36314; CCLXIII 95, 96, CCCLXV 24) and another of the view east along the High Street (Tate D36316; Turner Bequest CCCLXV 26) ‘may have been made during the same session of work’; however, since Ryman only commissioned one view of Oxford, this and the other four would not be directly connected with the completed ‘North Hinksey’ vista, but possibly (depending on their dating before or after 1838) as ideas for late additions to England and Wales or ‘for a separate series of Oxford views that never saw the light of day’.7
See also the introductions to the present subsection of identified but unrealised Oxford subjects and the overall England and Wales ‘colour beginnings’ grouping to which this work has been assigned.
Technical notes:
As Eric Shanes notes,1 this is one of four Oxford colour studies which are closely related physically. Tate D36314 (Turner Bequest CCCLXV 24, watermarked 1837) and Tate D25218 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII 96) have matching serrations at the bottom of their respective compositions where the original super royal-format sheet was torn in half. The two were worked up on opposite faces of the overall sheet, presumably after it was halved, as there is no overlap of watercolour wash from the front of one to the back of the other. All of the above applies to the present work and Tate D25217 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII 95), also originally a single sheet. Shanes observes that ‘all four drawings manifest extremely similar serrations that resulted from the two super royal sheets being torn in half simultaneously’.2 As noted in the main catalogue entry above, he also deduces that their ‘distinctive, shared characteristics’, along with those of a fifth Oxford study, Tate D36316 (Turner Bequest CCCLXV 26, watermarked 1837), suggest that they ‘may have been made during the same work session’.3
As Eric Shanes notes,1 this is one of four Oxford colour studies which are closely related physically. Tate D36314 (Turner Bequest CCCLXV 24, watermarked 1837) and Tate D25218 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII 96) have matching serrations at the bottom of their respective compositions where the original super royal-format sheet was torn in half. The two were worked up on opposite faces of the overall sheet, presumably after it was halved, as there is no overlap of watercolour wash from the front of one to the back of the other. All of the above applies to the present work and Tate D25217 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII 95), also originally a single sheet. Shanes observes that ‘all four drawings manifest extremely similar serrations that resulted from the two super royal sheets being torn in half simultaneously’.2 As noted in the main catalogue entry above, he also deduces that their ‘distinctive, shared characteristics’, along with those of a fifth Oxford study, Tate D36316 (Turner Bequest CCCLXV 26, watermarked 1837), suggest that they ‘may have been made during the same work session’.3
Verso:
Blank (not examined out of frame).
Blank (not examined out of frame).
Matthew Imms
March 2013
How to cite
Matthew Imms, ‘Oxford from North Hinksey c.1837–9 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2013, https://www