Oil paint on canvas
Switzerland
Tate Collection
Works with images
Works on loan
Joseph Mallord William Turner
Turner Bequest
Oil paintings
Collection
Turner owned by Tate
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/joseph-mallord-william-turner-558" aria-label="More by Joseph Mallord William Turner" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Joseph Mallord William Turner</a>
Lake Lucerne Bay Uri above Brunnen
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
abstraction
Alps
architecture
bank
countries and continents
from recognisable sources
hut
lake
Lake Lucerne, Bay of Uri
landscape
mist
natural features (non-UK)
places
residential
Switzerland
water: inland
weather
<p>This scumbled and brilliant paint surface is, at first, difficult to decipher. A small house beneath a cliff is discernible in the lower left corner, while mountains loom on the right hand side of the canvas. It is thought to have been begun a year or two after Turner’s visit to Switzerland in 1842, and has been connected to a watercolour of the same subject completed that year.</p><p><em>Gallery label, February 2010</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
22 July 2002 – 21 May 2007
2007-05-21
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2002-07-22
Finished or Unfinished
Collection based display
1 June 2007 – 15 March 2009
2009-03-15
1 June 2007
2007-06-01
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2007-06-01
Interrupted Visions: Oil Sketches 1820s-1840s
Collection based display
20 March 2009 – 27 July 2009
2009-07-27
20 March 2009
2009-03-20
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2009-03-20
Turner's Later Oil Sketches and Unfinished Works
Collection based display
5 August 2009 – 19 July 2010
2010-07-19
5 August 2009 – 19 July 2010
2010-07-19
2009-08-05
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2009-08-05
Turner Abroad
Collection based display
10 September 2014 – 20 September 2015
2015-09-20
10 September 2014 – 25 January 2015
2015-01-25
2014-09-10
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2014-09-10
Late Turner: Painting Set Free
Exhibition
24 April 2015 – 20 July 2015
2015-07-20
24 April 2015 – 20 July 2015
2015-07-20
2015-04-24
Oita Prefectural Museum (Oita, Japan)
2015-04-24
Modern: Blossoming Garden
Loan-out
6 July 2019 – 2 May 2021
2021-05-02
6 July 2019 – 13 October 2019
2019-10-13
2019-07-06
Kunstmuseum (Luzern, Switzerland)
http://www.kunstmuseumluzern.ch
2019-07-06
The Sea and the Alps: Turner's Quest for the Sublime
Tate partnerships & programmes
16 October 2021 – 14 July 2023
2023-07-14
16 October 2021 – 6 March 2022
2022-03-06
2021-10-16
ARoS Aarhus Kunstmuseum (Aarhus, Denmark)
18 May 2022 – 11 September 2022
2022-09-11
2022-05-18
Museu Nacional d’Art de Catalunya (Barcelona, Spain)
http://www.mnac.es
8 October 2022 – 5 February 2023
2023-02-05
2022-10-08
National Gallery of Ireland (Dublin, Ireland)
http://www.nationalgallery.ie
3 March 2023 – 25 June 2023
2023-06-25
2023-03-03
Fondation Pierre Gianadda (Martigny, Switzerland)
2021-10-16
Turner Watercolours: Sun is God
Tate partnerships & programmes
28 October 2023 – 10 March 2024
2024-03-10
28 October 2023 – 10 March 2024
2024-03-10
2023-10-28
Stadtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus (Munich, Germany)
2023-10-28
Turner at Lenbachhaus Munich
Loan-out
6 July 2024 – 15 January 2028
2028-01-15
6 July 2024 – 1 September 2024
2024-09-01
2024-07-06
Grimaldi Forum (Monaco, Monaco)
30 September 2024 – 7 May 2025
2025-05-07
2024-09-30
Museum of Art Pudong (Shanghai, China)
21 June 2025 – 5 October 2025
2025-10-05
2025-06-21
Queensland Art Gallery of Modern Art (Brisbane, Australia)
1 June 2026 – 1 October 2026
2026-10-01
2026-06-01
External
15 November 2026 – 15 March 2027
2027-03-15
2026-11-15
External
1 May 2027 – 1 September 2027
2027-09-01
2027-05-01
External
15 October 2027 – 15 January 2028
2028-01-15
2027-10-15
External
2024-07-06
Turner's Sublime Legacy
Tate partnerships & programmes
Lake Lucerne: the Bay of Uri from above Brunnen
support: 727 × 983 mm
frame: 835 × 1095 × 56 mm
Accepted by the nation as part of the <a href="/search?gid=999999781" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Turner Bequest</a> 1856
<p>This scumbled and brilliant paint surface is, at first, difficult to decipher.  A small house beneath a cliff is discernible in the lower left corner, while mountains loom on the right hand side of the canvas.  It is thought to have been begun a year or two after Turner’s visit to Switzerland in 1842, and has been connected to a watercolour of the same subject completed that year.
<br/></p>

Display caption
2010-02-18T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p>
Turner applied his oil paint to a commercially primed canvas. The priming contains lead white and chalk and is pale pink/mushroom in tone. Preliminary layers are painted in thin glazes and scumbles. Over these an opaque white paint, sometimes mixed with other colours has been applied with a palette knife and brush. There are many small, sometimes sharp impasted areas. Preliminary pencil drawing is visible, particularly in the area of the cottage suggesting that this painting may well be at an early stage of Turner's creative process. The grid-like dirt impressions visible on its surface are evidence that the artist stacked his unfinished paintings while they were still wet. The shapes are the impressions of other canvases.  It is interesting to speculated whether or not he intended to return to the painting and work it to a higher level of finish at some later stage.
</p>
<p>
The right hand edge of this painting was severely damaged in the Thames Flood of 1928. As a result the canvas had been lined and the losses filled and retouched. Although the painting is now structurally stable discolouration of the retouching is aesthetically disfiguring.
</p>
<p>
It is possible that the painting is lighter in appearance than the artist intended, as a result of the fading of light sensitive pigments. The paint medium has a tendency to darken and lighten depending upon the amount of light it is exposed to.
</p>
<p>
Elizabeth Reissner<br/>
February 2001
</p>
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Technique and condition
2001-08-08T00:00:00
technique-and-condition
TECHNIQUE_AND_CONDITION_TEXT
<p><b>521. </b>[<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/turner-lake-lucerne-the-bay-of-uri-from-above-brunnen-n05476" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N05476</span></a>]<b> Mountain Scene with Lake and Hut</b> <i>c.</i>
1840–5</p>
<p>THE TATE GALLERY, LONDON (5476)</p>
<p>Oil and pencil on canvas, 28 × 38 (71 × 96·5)</p>
<p><b>Coll.</b> Turner Bequest 1856 (141, one of 2 each 3'2" × 2'4" with No. 522; identified 1946 and 1973 by chalk number on back); transferred to the Tate Gallery 1947.</p>
<p><b>Exh.</b> R.A. 1974–5 (569).</p>
<p><b>Lit.</b> Davies 1946, pp. 157, 188; Butlin 1981, p. 45.</p>
<p>Correctly grouped with No. 522 [<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/turner-sunset-from-the-top-of-the-rigi-n05486" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N05486</span></a>] in the schedule of the Turner Bequest as similar not only in size but also in style, handling and subject. The scene may well be a Swiss lake, being similar to those depicted by Turner in a number of <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolours</span></a> of the 1840s. The two pictures are akin in style and subject to the National Gallery of Victoria's <i>Val d'Aosta</i> (No. 520). Both Nos. 521 [<span>N05476</span>] and 522 [<span>N05486</span>] are painted on <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/canvas" title="Glossary definition for 'Canvas'"><span>canvases</span></a> bearing the form of T. Brown stamp that seems to have come into use in about 1839.</p>
<p>A rectilinear pattern of lines of dirt impressed into the paint when it was still wet, and a similarly impressed <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/i/impasto" title="Glossary definition for 'Impasto'"><span>texture</span></a> from canvas in the lower right-hand corner, show that other pictures were leant against this one while it was fresh in Turner's studio; the lines have been minimised by conservation treatment. The original paint is missing down the left-hand edge.</p>
<p><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, <i>The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner</i>, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-07T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
abstraction Alps architecture bank countries and continents from recognisable sources hut lake Lake Lucerne, Bay of Uri landscape mist natural features (non-UK) places residential Switzerland water: inland weather