Edinburgh, Castle Hill 1801

Editor: So, this is Turner's "Edinburgh, Castle Hill," a faint pencil sketch, located at the Harvard Art Museums. It’s so subtle; I almost missed it! What strikes you most about this fleeting vision of Edinburgh? Curator: It's like Turner's baring the bones of a place, isn’t it? Stripping away the color and drama to reveal the essence of the city's form. I see a whisper of history, a ghost of a landscape. Does it make you wonder what he was thinking in that moment? Perhaps capturing the ephemeral nature of memory itself. Editor: Definitely! It makes me think about how much detail he could include in his memory, then translate to paper. Curator: Precisely! Turner coaxes us to consider what remains when the spectacle fades. Editor: I love that, a ghost of a landscape! I’ll never look at a Turner sketch the same way again.