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

D20084–D20093; D20095–D20138; D41007–D41009; D41508–D41509

CCXVII 1–44

Sketchbook bound in boards covered with grey-blue marbled paper, with brown leather spine and the remains of a brass clasp
Signed and inscribed in black ink by Henry Scott Trimmer ‘N^o 247 – | Contains 22 Leaves. Pencil Sketches | on both sides – | H.S. Trimmer’ and signed by Charles Turner
Signed in pencil by Charles Locke Eastlake ‘C.L.E.’ and John Prescott Knight ‘J.P.K.’
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram towards top of leather spine on front cover and near centre on inside front cover
Stamped in black ‘CCXVII’ at top right of front cover and top left of inside front cover
Contains two different white wove papers
Watermarked ‘[...] ells | 1821’ and ‘1821’
Approximate size of page 99 x 162 mm

Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

Turner used the Huy and Dinant sketchbook early on in the 1824 Meuse-Moselle tour, employing it for little more than a week. The artist inaugurated the book in Liège on 13 August and drew in it as he navigated the Meuse downstream through Belgium, towards and just beyond the French border. Given the book’s horizontal format, it proved particularly useful for wide-angle, full- and double-page landscape studies, many of which are strikingly detailed.

There are drawings of the landmarks and quayside at Liège (Tate D20084, D20095–D20103; Turner Bequest CCXVII 1, 8–12), the abbey at Flône (Tate D20085–D20086; Turner Bequest CCXVII 1a–2), the cities of Huy, Dinant and Namur, each dominated by citadels (Tate D20087–D20093, D20104–D20113, D41508; Turner Bequest CCXVII 2a–6a, 12a–19) and the fortified town of Givet (Tate D20114, D41009; Turner Bequest CCXVII 20). These drawings were taken from 13 to 19 August during the first ten days of Turner’s tour. There are also views drawn later in the tour depicting the German city of Trier on the Moselle (Tate D20111, D20115, D41009; Turner Bequest CCXVII 17a, 21) and Abbeville in Northern France, where Turner stayed on 10 and 13 September 1824 just before he departed for England (Tate 20116 – D20117; Turner Bequest CCXVII 22–23).

Finberg writes that during the nineteenth century the leaves in this book were ‘distributed and numbered’.1 The most accomplished of the drawings were then exhibited at the National Gallery on successive occasions until at least 1904. As a result of their overexposure, many of the leaves have browned considerably and the pencil has faded.