As a boy, Turner liked to go up to Hampstead Heath in North London and lie on his back to draw the sky, then return to town to sell his day’s work. Late in life he made many coloured studies, often in Kent which he believed had the finest skies in Europe. This edition of the sketchbook reproduces these beautiful drawings and watercolours in facsimile, with an illustrated introduction by Turner expert David Blayney Brown. Besides many watercolour studies of sky effects, pencil sketches of places in London and the surrounding area are also featured.

David Blayney Brown is Manton Curator of British Art, 1790– 1850, at Tate Britain.