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

There are four bands of sketches here, working down the page. All continue across folio 10 verso opposite (D32561; CCCXXII 11a) or relate to similar subjects there. The two landscapes in the top half show rugged hills beyond level foregrounds, and likely show prospects from the River Rhine; the first of a short identified sequence around Rüdesheim and Bingen, west of Mainz, is on the verso (D32563). This half of the first view includes what is probably a castle on the lower slopes. The other half of the second includes a scrawled word or two, one perhaps beginning with ‘M’.

The two studies below are comparatively detailed, and show buildings on a skyline, including towers and spires. It is the most detailed of all the drawings on this spread, and seems to be a continuation or reprise of the view on the opposite page; there is an inconsequential further continuation to the right above the main view. The last main sketch is inverted relative to the other drawings, and includes a tower or possibly a square-rigged sail, seemingly continuing again from the other page, where the same or similar steeples are seen again. Finally, there is another urban skyline squeezed in above (at the bottom of the page as foliated). The first of the urban views is labelled something like ‘Buderick Rhine’ on the opposite page, and though only the first three letters of the first word are absolutely clear, Finberg confidently interpreted it as ‘Büderich’ without further comment;1 this interpretation is likely correct.

Of three possibilities in present-day Nordrhein-Westfalen, two are along the Rhine. The first Turner would have passed is part of Meerbusch, on the west bank not far north-west of Düsseldorf (see folios 25 verso–26 recto; D32591–D32592; CCCXXII 26a, 27) and the second, on the same bank, is south-west of the centre of Wesel (see folio 49 verso; D32637; CCCXXII 50a), roughly thirty miles downriver to the north as the crow flies. Later changes make it unclear as to whether the buildings survive or were recorded in either vicinity. See folio 37 verso (D32613; CCCXXII 38a) for another likely subject along this stretch.

As set out in its Introduction, this sketchbook covers Turner’s homeward route from Augsburg north-westwards to Rotterdam (see under folios 1 verso and 14 recto respectively; D32543, D32568; CCCXXII 2a, 15). Travelling back down the familiar river, he worked in somewhat randomly from both ends, interspersing identifiable subjects with less distinctive renderings of towns, castles and the landscape.