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

D03736–D03777, D40806–D40808

Turner Bequest LXIII 1–41a

Sketchbook bound in laid paper cover reinforced with calf leather
40 leaves of white laid paper; page size 158 x 98 mm; watermark ‘1796’
Numbered 391 as part of the Turner Schedule in 1854, and endorsed by the Executors of the Turner Bequest inside front cover (D40806)
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram on front cover, centre left

Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

This little sketchbook is a comparatively rare example of the kind of all-purpose notebook that Turner sometimes kept in his pocket in London; most of the books in the Turner Bequest were dedicated to the recording of places visited on tour, while a few, like Calais Pier (Tate; Turner Bequest LXXXI) were evidently looked on as repositories of ideas for pictures rather than sources for specific subjects.

In this case there is no evidence that the book was ever taken out of London, or seen as a source of subject matter; the handful of studies of barges were probably made on the Thames, close to home, and there is nothing else in the book except two bills for artist’s colours on folios 6 recto and 41 verso (D03741, D03777), and the musical memoranda inside the front cover (D40806), which suggest a new interest following Turner’s involvement with the family of the organist and composer John Danby (1757–1798), famous for his glees. Drawings of a family singing round a table or a chamber organ survive in the Bequest (Tate D08201, D40283; CXIX N, verso of CXIX X) and may record Danby’s family in a customary recreation.

Finberg records a ‘parchment label on back’ (meaning the spine), which has since been lost; it was inscribed ‘59’.1