Ludlow Castle, Shropshire

Turner depicted ancient castles and other military fortifications in almost half of the subjects in his celebrated series of Picturesque Views of England and Wales (1825-38). His images invariably evoked the unsettled, martial character of British history, implicitly juxtaposing such events with the recent conflicts against Napoleon. But the creation of the series also coincided with the establishment of a more romantic interest in these remains, whose appeal had formerly been limited to antiquarians.
One of the finest England and Wales watercolours still in private hands, this pastoral view of Ludlow Castle perfectly epitomises this shift in the perception of historic ruins. Here Turner shows the battlement walls warmly illuminated by afternoon sunshine from a position to the north-west of the town, with the lofty bell-tower of St Laurence’s church (‘the cathedral of the Marches’) to the left. On the other side of the castle is Dinham Bridge, to the south, which was the subject of two of Turner’s early watercolours: Huntington Library, San Marino (W.264); and Barber Institute, Birmingham (W.265). The massed accumulation of the castle’s towers shimmers as if seen in a mirage, and the effect is further heightened in the diaphanous reflection in the River Teme below. Instead of echoes of gunfire, or the clash of swords, Turner conjures up a tranquil stillness that is only disturbed by a moorhen as it skims across the water, its sudden outburst of throaty clucking threatening to wake the baby in the arms of one of the gleaners resting in the foreground.
The origins of the castle go back to the 11th Century, following the Norman conquest, when it was constructed as a stronghold to protect the border with Wales. Over the following centuries it was regularly the focus of the friction between the two nations, gradually expanding over time to consolidate its strategic function by including apartments fit to host visiting royalty. Eight years before the Civil Wars brought an end to its importance, the Great Hall in Ludlow Castle was the setting for the performance of Milton’s masque Comus (see Turner’s watercolour vignette, engraved by Goodall, for John Macrone’s 1835 edition of Milton’s Poetical Works; W.1270).
Turner’s England and Wales watercolour was painted around 1829-30, while the first parts of the series were attracting favourable reviews. As was the case for many views in this project, he only rarely made new visits to the sites depicted, and more frequently resorted to the diligent sketches he had made during his extensive travels in the 1790s. The view of Ludlow, for example, relies on sketches dating from 1798, towards the end of a long tour through Wales. Soon after his visit that year it seems that Turner was commissioned to develop a finished watercolour from the pencil sketch that served as the basis for this England and Wales design. This request came from one of his earliest patrons, Viscount Malden, whose home at Hampton Court in Herefordshire he visited on his way home from Ludlow to London. Malden did not become Earl of Essex until March 1799, so the inscriptions confirming his commissions on the back of the Ludlow and Hampton Court sketches postdate the tour by at least six months. Although Turner set to work on the agreed selection, for some reason the promised watercolour of Ludlow remained unfinished and was eventually found among the contents of Turner’s studio (TB XLIV i; Tate, D01911).
Another neighbouring estate Turner called at in 1798 was Powis Castle, about thirty miles to the north-west of Ludlow. Its owner George Herbert, the 2nd Earl of Powis, was at that date also leasing Ludlow Castle. In the preceding decades he had restored some of the external fabric of the castle, as well as improving the surrounding landscape setting through the addition of paths and the planting of trees. It is possible to get a sense of the relatively young saplings in the sketch that served as the basis for this watercolour, which Turner used to frame the castle when composing his scene (TB XXXVIII 63; Tate, D01317).
In working from the pencil outline thirty years later, he replaced the twined trunks on the right with an Italianate stone pine, elegantly curving towards the building – a feature that Eric Shanes has observed is ‘an unlikely sight in Shropshire’ (see the colour beginnings featuring this Claudian device which were identified by Shanes as an intermediate stage in the development of the Image: TB CCLXIII 49, 55; Tate, D25171, D25177). Down in the left corner of the pencil sketch, another clump of trees and the weir beside them are dispensed with in the finished work to create the wide glassy expanse of water. Architectural historians will also note that Turner’s realisation of the battlements in the watercolour, despite being correctly transcribed in his sketch, is not always accurate, particularly for the North-West Tower. But in all his modifications, it must be agreed that he sacrificed veracity for stunning visual effect.
We are grateful to Ian Warrell for his help in preparing this catalogue entry.