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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Bock, Luxembourg c.1839

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
The Bock, Luxembourg c.1839
D20273
Turner Bequest CCXXII N
Gouache, pen and ink and watercolour on blue wove paper, 139 x 189 mm
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCXXII N’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
In this gouache of Luxembourg Turner pictures the Bock, one of three fortified plateaux which dominate the city. The view is taken from a high vantage point to the east of Luxembourg and is similar to Tate D20285; Turner Bequest CCXXII Z. The Bock promontory is depicted running diagonally across the page. Turner derived the composition of this work from pencil sketches in the Givet, Mézières, Verdun, Metz, Luxemburg and Trèves sketchbook of 1839 (Tate D28267–D28269, D28272, D28273; Turner Bequest CCLXXXVIII 57–58, 59a, 60).
For other of Turner’s 1839 gouaches of Luxembourg see Tate D20244–D20249, D20264, D20270, D20272, D20284, N05240; Turner Bequest CCXXI K–CCXXI P, CCXXII E, CCXXII K, CCXXII M, CCXXII Y.
Verso:
Inscribed in pencil ‘27a’ top centre towards right; stamped in black with Turner Bequest monogram and ‘CCXXII–N’ bottom left; inscribed in pencil ‘CCXXII N’ bottom right.

Alice Rylance-Watson
June 2013

How to cite

Alice Rylance-Watson, ‘The Bock, Luxembourg c.1839 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, November 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-the-bock-luxembourg-r1150978, accessed 30 June 2024.