THE WATER-COLOURS OF
J. M. W. TURNER
TEXT BY
W. G. RAWLINSON
AND A. J. FINBERG
FOREWORD BY
SIR CHARLES HOLROYD, R.E.
MCMIX
OFFICES OF ‘THE STUDIO’
LONDON, PARIS AND NEW YORK
PREFATORY NOTE.
The Editor desires to acknowledge his indebtedness to the following
collectors of Turner’s water-colours who have kindly lent their drawings
for reproduction in this volume:--Mr. C. Morland Agnew, Sir Hickman
Bacon, Bart., Mr. Ralph Brocklebank, Rev. William MacGregor, Mr. W. G.
Rawlinson, Mr. J. F. Schwann, and Mr. W. Yates.
The Editor wishes especially to express his thanks to Mr. W. G.
Rawlinson, who, in addition to allowing several examples from his
collection to be reproduced, has rendered valuable assistance in various
other ways in the preparation of this volume.
ARTICLES.
A Foreword by Sir Charles Holroyd, R.E. page 1
The Water-Colour Drawings of J. M. W. Turner, R.A.
By W. G. Rawlinson ” 4
The Turner Drawings in the National Gallery, London.
By A. J. Finberg ” 28
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
Plate I. The Archbishop’s Palace, Lambeth. From the
Collection of W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” II. The Mouth of the Avon. From the Collection
of W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” III. Peterborough Cathedral from the North. From
the Collection of W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” IV. The Pent, Dover. From the Collection of
W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” V. Distant View of Lichfield Cathedral. From the
Collection of W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” VI. Edinburgh: from St. Margaret’s Loch. In the
National Gallery, London.
” VII. Stonehenge--Sunset. From the Collection of
W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” VIII. Scarborough. From the Collection of C. Morland
Agnew, Esq.
” IX. Lulworth Cove. From the Collection of W. G.
Rawlinson, Esq.
” X. Goarhausen and Katz Castle. From the Collection
of W. G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” XI. The Lake of Nemi. From the Collection of
C. Morland Agnew, Esq.
” XII. Turin: from the Church of the Superga. From
the Collection of C. Morland Agnew, Esq.
” XIII. The Crook of the Lune. From the Collection
of Rev. William MacGregor.
” XIV. Norham Castle. In the National Gallery, London.
” XV. Launceston. From the Collection of J.F.
Schwann, Esq.
” XVI. Barnard Castle. From the Collection of W.G.
Rawlinson, Esq.
” XVII. On the Lake at Petworth--Evening. In the
National Gallery, London.
” XVIII. Cowes. From the Collection of W. Yates, Esq.
” XIX. Venice: The Salute from S. Giorgio Maggiore.
National Gallery, London.
” XX. Venice: Casa Grimani and the Rialto. In the
National Gallery, London.
” XXI. Lucerne. In the National Gallery, London.
” XXII. A Swiss Lake. From the Collection of Sir
Hickman Bacon, Bart.
” XXIII. Bellinzona: from the South. In the National
Gallery, London.
” XXIV. Bellinzona: from the road to Locarno. In the
National Gallery, London.
” XXV. Lausanne: from Le Signal. From the Collection
of W.G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” XXVI. Lausanne. In the National Gallery, London.
” XXVII. Zurich. In the National Gallery, London.
” XXVIII. The Seelisberg: Moonlight. From the Collection
of W.G. Rawlinson, Esq.
” XXIX. Schaffhausen: The Town. From the Collection
of Ralph Brocklebank, Esq.
” XXX. Tell’s Chapel, Fluelen. From the Collection of
W.G. Rawlinson, Esq.
A FOREWORD BY SIR CHARLES HOLROYD, R.E.
I am particularly glad to write a foreword to this collection of
reproductions of water-colours by J. M. W. Turner, as they are perhaps
the best renderings of the beautiful originals that I have yet seen. The
more reproductions we can have of the master’s drawings the more will it
be possible to study properly his great message, and the more will his
genius be recognised. I would like to see everyone of his nineteen
thousand water-colour sketches and lead-pencil drawings reproduced, so
that we could all hold them in our hands and carry them about with us;
for in them there is an unfailing beauty of composition, and a glorious
truth of effect and of detail, by which Turner managed to make complete
pictures out of even the fewest touches. No one realises Turner’s full
genius till he studies these drawings, often made in the very presence
of nature. They teach us to look at her with a new and seeing eye. Their
absolute truth has hardly yet been fully recognised. I have had the
fortune to carry reproductions of these drawings with me in Wharfedale
and in Venice, and I have compared them touch for touch with nature.
Often and often have I been able to see the meaning of what appears a
careless scratch or even an accidental wriggle, only when the actual
scene was before me. They are mostly drawn from one exact spot, as may
be seen by the crossing of the branches of the trees, although these are
now so many years older, and the folding of the hills. It was in the
seventies that I first made these comparisons in Wharfedale and I still
remember my delight at recognising the gnarled markings on three ash
trees a little below Bolton Abbey; the angle of their growth forming a
rough letter N was identical although they were mere saplings in
Turner’s drawing, and even the broken bank of the river was still the
same, all the winter floods of variable Wharfe not having washed away
nature’s truth to Turner’s drawing. My experiences in Venice are
similar. With the reproduction in my hand I could say that Turner drew a
particular scene from a particular flagstone on the quay, or _piazza_.
The lines of the houses on both sides of the canal cut one another in
the exact way they did in Turner’s sketches only from one particular
spot, but from there the whole scene was complete exactly. Many subjects
were sketched from the middle of the canal and owing to the movement of
the water it was not easy to compare exactly the reproductions with the
scenes in nature. Curiously nearly all these scenes from the canal were
taken from the _traghettos_, or ferries, of which there are several up
and down the Grand Canal, where gondolas wait for hire, tied to their
posts, somewhat as cabs stand in their ranks in our streets. It is
possible that Turner in his economy made use of these waiting gondolas
by giving the gondolier a palanca for permission to sit in a gondola
whilst it was thus at rest. It was an ideal place for working from in
his day, for no “penny steamboats” then splashed up and down the canal
making things rock in their wake, but peace reigned in the reflections
of the palaces.
Only very few of the drawings of which I had reproductions went
unrecognised; one was a view from high up, probably from some room in
the monastery of San Giorgio, and others all contained a view of a tall
tower, which, from the neighbouring buildings, ought to have been the
Campanile of San Marco. But the tower in the drawings had an extra
cornice on the slope of the pyramidal top, with supports below, which I
could in no wise reconcile with nature and which puzzled me for some
time, in fact until I saw the restoration begun on the tower of San
Giorgio. Then I found that the extra cornice and supports were a
peculiar and ingenious form of scaffolding, used for the placing of new
tiles on the steep slope of the pyramidal top--and sure enough when I
got back to London and looked at the original drawing with a glass, the
touches of water-colour indicated the scaffolding quite plainly, and a
wonderful small splash of colour enabled one to realise the angel on the
top, wings and all. I found, too, that all drawings, in which the
Campanile appeared, done by Turner during that visit, gave the
restoration works quite plainly, even when the tower was seen from a
long way off. The beauty of the touches in Turner’s drawings from nature
can only be fully appreciated when the drawing, or a reproduction of it,
is compared with the actual subject, for every bend and movement of the
supple brush means something. It is not possible to convey the drawings
all over Turner’s far-stretching wanderings, but, if only we had good
reproductions of them all, what a pleasure we should all have, and how
much we should learn to appreciate his greatness. I should like to see,
as I have said, every fragment before the public. It is practically the
only way of using our great legacy fully. The original drawings are
perishable things, and must not always be in the light; many have faded
already, let us reproduce them while we may. The slighter sketches
reproduce best, as may be seen in this book. Such drawings as the
_Edinburgh from St. Margaret’s Loch_, about 1801 (Plate VI.), for
example. Note, too, the splendid sketch of _Barnard Castle_, about 1827
(Plate XVI.); how well it comes, we can almost see the brush-marks draw
the forms of the foliage, and the way Turner has used the water; they
are perfect in their way. When Turner worked up a drawing it became like
a lovely flower with a delicate bloom upon its infinite distances, as in
the _Lake of Nemi_, about 1818 (Plate XI.), and the _Crook of the Lune_
(Plate XIII.); they are like a gloxinia or an auricula. This curious
beauty of theirs was often obtained, as it appears to me, by alterations
in the surface of the paper and by colour left in the grain of the paper
after washing out or rubbing down a tone--it alters when the lighting of
the drawing is altered, and its changeableness is part of its beauty.
I should like to see reproductions of the sketch books, made page by
page and bound in similar bindings to the originals, where these exist.
Mr. Finberg has lately put some of these books together again--some
drawings having been removed from the books for exhibition--for purposes
of the very useful inventory of our Turner drawings that he is so
carefully making for the Trustees of the National Gallery. The books are
much more interesting when seen together. I remember one which Turner
had with him in the Lake District and you could trace his itinerary by
turning over the pages. He evidently left Keswick in the morning and
drew two or three views of Lodore and the end of the Lake of
Derwentwater, the hills getting bigger as he comes nearer to them;
familiar views of Castle Cragg and the river come next, and to me some
most interesting views of that wide-spreading mountain Glaramara, some
of them from unfamiliar points of view; but I was able to recognise them
because I have stayed for a month at a time in farmhouses on the lower
slopes, and I have explored that beautiful mountain’s inmost caves.
After this Honister Crag and Buttermere appear in due course. How
interesting it would be to have reproductions of such books and follow
the track of the master page by page. How we should learn to know him
and to see familiar scenes with his eye. We should find that
exaggeration was not the character of his landscape drawing, when he was
working from nature, but insight into the forms. His effects of extra
height can generally be got by sitting low on the ground or even right
in a ditch. From his drawings, from those in this book of reproductions,
we learn again a forgotten truth. Fine drawing, form, is the essential
in our art; great and noble colourist as Turner was, we have had other
fine colourists in the British school of water-colour painting, but it
is just in his drawing and his sense of the beauty and significance of
line that he is supreme. As Titian in Venice excelled the great
colourists of his time, such as Bonifazio and Paris Bordone, so by his
drawing and sense of form Turner excelled as a draughtsman even more
than as a colourist.
CHARLES HOLROYD.
THE WATER-COLOUR DRAWINGS OF J. M. W. TURNER, R.A. BY W. G. RAWLINSON.
What makes Turner’s water-colour drawings so profoundly
interesting--apart from their extraordinary and enduring
attractiveness--is the fact that in them lies before you, plainly
visible, the whole course and development of his art. And the
continuousness and regularity of that development are remarkable. There
are no pauses, no gaps, hardly a table-land; only one steady, continued
progress. No matter how high a point he reached, he was never content to
rest there, but was always pressing onward to fresh achievement, trying
new effects, challenging new difficulties even down to the last years of
his life. To anyone familiar with his work in water-colour, it is
generally easy to date his drawings within a year or two.
No doubt the growth of his art can also be traced in his oil pictures,
but with some important differences. In them, even up to middle life, he
was constantly and strongly influenced by the work of other painters
whom he was often consciously or unconsciously rivalling. First Richard
Wilson, then Van de Velde and Bakhuysen, afterwards Gaspar Poussin,
Claude, Cuyp, Rembrandt, Titian and others, all in turn had their effect
on him. As a result of this rivalry, his oil pictures were less
spontaneous, less sincere than his water-colours. His lack of education
also unfitted him to be the painter of the classical and sacred subjects
in which he attempted to compete with the old masters. No doubt there
were brilliant exceptions--such, for example, as _Mercury and Herse_,
_Ulysses deriding Polyphemus_, and others, but I think Ruskin was
justified in calling many of them “nonsense pictures.” Moreover, in his
oil paintings Turner was constantly experimenting--not always
successfully--both with his materials and his methods and, as a
consequence, many, especially those of his later years, have greatly
suffered with time.
But in his water-colours, after his first years or training and
experiment, he was simply and always himself--he was Turner. Paul
Sandby, John Cozens, Malton, Hearne, De Loutherbourg, and others of the
older water-colour painters, all had their influence on him, but in no
case did it last long. The two men who affected him most were Cozens and
Girtin, his friend and fellow student, of whom more will be said
hereafter. But by 1800, or at the latest 1802, Turner had passed all his
contemporaries, and stood alone, the acknowledged head of the English
school of water-colour painting, which in the-first half of the
nineteenth century was to reach its zenith. Before attempting to trace
the course of his art from its simple beginnings to its glorious close,
a few brief words may be desirable as to his early life and
surroundings.
Born, it is usually supposed (but by no means known with certainty), in
1775, of humble parents--his father was a barber in Maiden Lane,
Strand--at a quite early age he developed unusual powers of drawing. The
barber proudly exposed his boy’s works in his shop window, and
occasionally sold them for a shilling or two apiece; he also showed them
to his customers, amongst whom was Thomas Stothard, R.A., who praised
them and advised him to make an artist of his son. It is impossible
accurately to trace his life before 1789, when he was presumably
fourteen, but it is clear that he had only some brief intervals of
schooling, first at a suburban and then at a sea-side academy--both
probably of the cheapest and poorest middle-class type--in fact he never
had any education worthy the name. He received lessons in drawing,
however, from various teachers, including Malton and probably Paul
Sandby, R.A. At about twelve or thirteen years of age, he was placed in
the workshop of the great mezzotint engraver, John Raphael Smith, who,
like many of his craft, was also a print dealer. Here Turner, along with
his future companion Girtin, was chiefly occupied in colouring prints
for sale, but he also learnt a great deal about engraving which was to
stand him in good stead in after life. After possibly another interval
of schooling, he passed, somewhere about his fourteenth year, into the
office of Mr. Hardwick, a distinguished architect, who employed him in
drawing and tinting “elevations,” adding landscape backgrounds to plans,
etc. It was here, no doubt, that he laid the foundation of the fine
architectural draughtsmanship which is noticeable in his earliest
exhibited works and throughout his life. Long before he had mastered
trees and foliage he could render accurately the lines and structure of
a great building, as well as its intricacies of detail, as, for example,
in the _West Front of Peterborough Cathedral_, which he exhibited at the
Royal Academy a year or two later. Water, also, seems to have presented
comparatively little difficulty to him from the first; owing possibly to
early studies at Brentford and Margate, at both or which places he was
at school. Very few, however, of his quite boyish drawings--I refer to
those before 1790--have survived, and those few are mostly copies of
prints or of works of other artists. One, _Folly Bridge and Bacon’s
Tower, Oxford_ (taken from the heading of an Oxford Almanack), may be
seen in the National Gallery (No. 613 N.G.); another in my possession,
_A Roadside Inn_--the earliest dated work by him (1786) known to me--is
possibly original, but more probably copied from a drawing by M. A.
Rooker, A.R.A.
From the architect’s office, at the instigation it is believed of Mr.
Hardwick himself, Turner in 1789 became a student at the Royal Academy,
and may be said to have definitely taken up an artist’s career. In the
following year, 1790, he sent his first drawing to the Royal Academy
Exhibition, then held in Somerset House. This was the _View of the
Archbishop’s Palace, Lambeth_, reproduced here (Plate I.). For the work
of a boy of fifteen, the good architectural drawing, the admirable
rendering of reflected light on the houses, the careful treatment of the
figures (the costumes are quite correct for 1790), and still more, the
effectiveness of the composition are remarkable. There is, however,
nothing original in the style, which is simply that of Malton and
Sandby.
To the next year’s exhibition (1791) he sent two drawings, one of which,
_The Interior of King John’s Palace, Eltham_, is a striking work, of
great originality. Not only has it the sound architectural
draughtsmanship before alluded to, but in its strong _chiaroscuro_, its
rendering of sunlight breaking through the ruined windows and lighting
the gloom, its sense of poetry and mystery, it would be creditable to
any artist of mature age.
A curious phase in Turner’s work of the next year--1792--merits notice.
Influenced probably by the pictures of De Loutherbourg, a French
painter, who had settled in England and had been made an R.A., Turner,
for a few months entirely changed his scheme of colour, adopting a
curious range of greyish and purplish browns as his prevailing tone, in
place of the pale greys, blues, and neutral tints, which, in common with
the other water-colour painters of the period, he had hitherto employed.
In this style are several drawings of Richmond Park, one or two of a
fire at the Pantheon, and many of the beautiful scenery on the downs
beyond Bristol, where, during his early life, he often stayed with
relatives. One, _The Mouth of the Avon_, is reproduced here (Plate II.).
In nearly all the Bristol drawings one special feature is noticeable.
Turner had evidently been struck by the unusual spectacle of the masts
and sails of the tall East-Indiamen, which were daily to be seen in full
sail under the thick woods of the Clifton downs, beating their way up
the narrow gorge of the Avon to the port of Bristol.
Turner continued to exhibit at the Royal Academy in 1793 and 1794. He
sold his drawings readily, and, although I cannot discover any public
references to his work before 1796, he must have attracted notice, as in
1793 he received a commission--his first--for drawings for engraving.
The “Copper-plate Magazine” (afterwards known as “The Itinerant”) was
one of many serials then in vogue which were illustrated by the
water-colour painters--“draftsmen” they were usually called--and in one
of its five volumes he is alluded to as “the ingenious Mr. Turner.” He
is said to have been paid two guineas apiece for these drawings, with a
very small allowance for travelling expenses, it being stipulated that
every subject should be drawn on the spot. With his slender wardrobe and
his painting materials on his back, carrying usually also his
fishing-rod, he tramped the country; he found his way into Kent, across
Wales, through Shropshire and Cheshire, on to Cumberland, and returned
by the Midlands. A reproduction of one of the “Copperplate Magazine”
drawings--_Peterborough Cathedral from the North_--will be found here
(Plate III.). Although on a small scale, it is typical of his work of
this period, and it shows the strong influence on him of his
contemporaries, Rooker, Hearne, and Dayes; yet there is always a decided
individuality of his own. As the late Mr. Cosmo Monkhouse[A] has well
remarked of these early drawings:--
“The great fact in comparing Turner and the other water-colour
painters of his own time is this, that while each of the best of
the others is remarkable for one or two special beauties of style
or effect, he is remarkable for all. He could reach near, if not
quite, to the golden simplicity of Girtin, to the silver sweetness
of Cozens; he could draw trees with the delicate dexterity of
Edridge, and equal the beautiful distances of Glover.... He was not
only technically the equal, if not the master of them all, but he
comprehended them, almost without exception.”
About this time (1793), Turner had the good fortune to attract the
notice of Dr. Monro, the leading Physician of Bethlehem Hospital, who
had a house in the Adelphi, and another at Bushey. He was a well-known
lover and patron of water-colour art, and was in the habit of inviting
promising young students, including Turner, Girtin, Varley, and other
afterwards well-known artists, to his house, where they were given
drawings by Rembrandt, Canaletto, Gainsborough, and other deceased
masters, to study and copy; especially also some recent sketches by John
Cozens, one of the most poetical of English painters, who had just
returned from Italy and Switzerland, where he had accompanied the
millionaire Beckford. The influence of Cozens on Turner was marked and
immediate, and the latter must have made a very large number of
transcripts of the elder painter’s works; in fact, all the very numerous
early drawings of Italian and Swiss subjects by Turner in Indian ink and
blue, which are so frequently to be met with, are copies from Cozens, as
Turner did not visit the Continent until 1802; yet, as I have before
remarked, all show a certain transformation in passing through his
hands. Dr. Monro gave the lads half-a-crown a night and their supper,
and kept their drawings. The training was an admirable one for them, and
when the doctor’s collection was dispersed at his death, it did not
prove a bad investment so far as he was concerned. Mr. Henderson,
another collector and amateur artist, afforded Turner and his companions
similar opportunities of studying and copying the works of older
painters.
From 1793 to 1796 Turner’s advance in power was steady. His subjects
were varied--English and Welsh cathedrals, old castles, ruined abbeys,
village churches, country towns, waterfalls and trout streams--the
latter generally with a bridge and always with an angler. He was himself
a keen fisherman, and his anglers’ attitudes are always carefully drawn
and at once recognisable. Occasionally some striking atmospheric effect,
seen probably on the spot, is introduced. Sometimes the picture is
strikingly enhanced by the play of sunlight, occasionally by boldly
treated _chiaroscuro_. The architecture is invariably drawn with
accuracy and taste, both as regards perspective and detail. His
colouring was a dainty harmony of broken tints in pale blues, greens,
browns, and neutral greys. Many good drawings of this time are in
private collections, and the Print Room of the British Museum contains
some fine examples which have been preserved from light, and are
consequently in perfect, unfaded condition--notably _Lincoln and
Worcester Cathedrals_, and _Tintern Abbey_. Most of the English
cathedrals were drawn by him between 1793 and 1796, including, in
addition to the two just named, Canterbury, Ely, Peterborough,
Rochester, Salisbury, and York; as well as Bath, Kirkstall, Malmesbury,
Malvern, Tintern, Ewenny, Llanthony, Waltham and many other abbeys,
together with castles innumerable--all in the delicate, “tinted manner.”
He also made a large number of studies of boats and shipping at Dover,
one of which is reproduced here (Plate IV.). It was probably there and
at Margate that he laid the foundation of the extraordinarily accurate
knowledge of everything connected with the sea and shipping which
distinguished him all his life.
His works of this early period are usually signed. The earliest
signature known to me is the one alluded to on page 5, “W. Turner,
1786.” For the next few years he signed either simply “Turner,” or
oftener “W. Turner,” occasionally adding the date. In 1799, when he was
elected an Associate of the Royal Academy, he changed to “W. Turner,
A.R.A.,” and in 1802, on receiving the honour of full membership, he
became “J. M. W. Turner, R.A.” A few years later he was appointed
Professor of Perspective to the Royal Academy, and much to the
amusement of his fellow academicians he now sometimes added “P.P.” In
the works of his later life, it is the exception to find any signature.
In Turner’s drawings of this period, as in those of the early English
water-colour school generally, one is struck by a freshness, a
simplicity, a new outlook on nature, which contrast with the works of
the classical painters who since the death of Rubens and the great Dutch
landscapists--Van Goyen, Cuyp, Hobbema, Van der Capelle, De Koninck, and
others--had for a century or more dominated European art. Landscape had
come to be regarded more as a fitting background to classical story, and
although often stately, was always more or less conventional. Now,
Nature was beginning to be studied and painted for her own sake. Yet
Turner, like Byron, throughout his life recognised that natural scenery
_alone_ never makes a completely satisfying picture--always there must
be some touch of the human element, some suggestion of human presence,
human handiwork. This, however, is entirely a different point of view
from that of the classical painters.
From the delicate tints which, up to 1795-6, had characterized the work
of Turner, in common with that of his contemporaries of the English
water-colour school, he passed, almost suddenly, in 1797, to a larger
and stronger style and a bolder range of colour, although the latter was
still limited as compared with the fuller tones of his middle and later
years. At first, in 1796, the pale blues and greens were simply deepened
and strongly accented, as was seen in the superb drawings of _Snowdon_
and _Cader Idris_ which were shown last year (1908) at the
Franco-British Exhibition, and to some extent in the _Distant View of
Exeter_, in the Tatham Sale of the same year. Soon, however, these tones
were combined and contrasted with deep, rich, golden browns. In 1797,
1798, and 1799, Turner sent to the Royal Academy Exhibitions a series of
magnificent drawings of large size, all showing a striking advance in
range and power. Eight views of _Salisbury Cathedral_ painted for Sir R.
Colt Hoare (two are in the Victoria and Albert Museum), the fine _Crypt
of Kirkstall Abbey_ (Sloane Museum), the still finer _Warkworth_
(Victoria and Albert Museum) and the famous _Norham Castle_ (the late
Mr. Laundy Walters), with several others, mark a new departure in his
art. Turner always said that he owed his success in life to the _Norham
Castle_. Thirty years later, when he was illustrating Scott’s works, and
was the guest of Sir Walter at Abbotsford, walking up Tweedside one day
in the company of Cadell the publisher, as they passed Norham Turner
took off his hat. On Cadell asking the reason, he replied, “That picture
made me.” Probably he considered that it was to its influence that he
owed his election as an Associate of the Royal Academy in 1799, the year
of its exhibition.
Some recent writers have contended that this great expansion of Turner’s
art was due to the influence of his friend and companion Thomas Girtin,
but they have adduced no evidence to support that theory. Girtin, it is
needless to say, was a very great painter, and his early death in 1802
was a severe loss to English art. And no doubt he and Turner, in their
constant intimacy, must have continually and considerably affected each
other--indeed up to 1795 it is often exceedingly difficult to
distinguish between the two men’s work. But, so far as I have been able
to study Girtin’s early drawings, I cannot discover in those executed
before 1797--the year which witnessed Turner’s new departure--any of the
breadth and boldness which marked both men from 1797 onwards. Certainly
no work of Girtin’s of 1796--the year previous--approaches in force
Turner’s _Snowdon_ and _Cader Idris_, which already in design if not in
colour herald his all-round expansion of 1797.
Nor does the current opinion of that day appear to support the view just
alluded to--quite the contrary. The “St. James’s Chronicle” of 1797,
after praising Turner’s _Transept of Ewenny Priory_ and _Choir of
Salisbury Cathedral_ in the Royal Academy Exhibition of that year, goes
on to remark that, “Mr. Girtin’s drawings in general _appear to be
formed in the style of Turner_.” Again, “The Sun” of 1799 devotes a long
paragraph to the eulogy of Turner’s _Carnarvon Castle_, concluding with
the remark, “This is a drawing that Claude might be proud to own”; it
then praises Girtin’s _Bethgellert_, but prefaces its notice with the
observation “We do not remember to have seen the name of the artist
before the present year. _The drawing is something after the style of
the preceding artist_” [Turner]. Redgrave also effectually disposes of
the question in “A Century of Painters,” 1866, Vol. II., page 402.
Moreover, Turner’s great drawings of 1797, 1798 and 1799 have
characteristics which are not at all those of Girtin. Already there is
visible something of that wonderful delicacy, that sense of mystery, of
‘infinity,’ that indefinable charm which we call ‘poetry,’ which
distinguishes his work--and especially his work in water-colour--from
that of every other landscape painter--work all the more remarkable in
that it proceeded from a man born in a back lane off the Strand, without
any education worthy of the name, and throughout his life unable to
speak or write grammatically--yet withal a man of strong intellect,
keenly ambitious, a reader, and a voluminous writer of poetry.
One drawing only of this period is reproduced here--_Distant View of
Lichfield Cathedral_ (Plate V.). It suffers from the unavoidable
reduction in size, but it is characteristic of Turner’s altered style.
Unfortunately it has at some time been varnished, probably by the
painter himself, as have two others equally important, of the same
period--_The Refectory of Fountains Abbey_ and a replica of the _Cader
Idris_--both of which are now in America. Gainsborough treated several
of his drawings similarly, as did Girtin, Varley, Barrett and others of
the early English school, their object being avowedly to rival in
water-colour the depth and richness of oil painting. But not
unfrequently, as here in the _Lichfield_, the varnish in time
disintegrates the colouring matter and produces a curious _granulated_
look, not unlike aquatint. Indeed, the fine _Fountains Abbey_ just
alluded to was sold not many years ago at a well-known London auction
room, as a coloured aquatint, and fetched only £5.
After Turner’s election in 1799 as an Associate of the Royal Academy, he
exhibited fewer water-colours and more oil pictures, although he was
continually producing drawings, mostly of large size and on commission.
For the next few years his style did not greatly alter, although a
steady growth in power and range is visible. Several large views of
_Edinburgh_ and its neighbourhood, a series of _Fonthill_ commissioned
by Beckford, another of _Chepstow_ executed for the Earl of Harewood,
together with the Welsh castles of _Conway_, _Carnarvon_, _St. Donat’s_
and _Pembroke_, are among the most important. The _Stonehenge_
reproduced here (Plate VII.) is probably the work of about 1803-1804.
He made also during this period a few drawings for engraving, but, with
the exception of the well-known _Oxford Almanacks_, these were chiefly
on a small scale and gave him but little scope; nor was he fortunate in
his engravers until in James Basire, the engraver to the University, he
met with an artist of higher standing. The University commissioned from
Turner ten large drawings for the headings of the _Oxford Almanacks_,
all of which he executed between 1798 and 1804. They are preserved in
the University Galleries, and are noticeable alike for their
architectural draughtsmanship, their admirable composition, and their
general breadth of treatment.
About this time, and also in connection with a commission for engraving,
he was first attracted to that Yorkshire scenery which was afterwards to
have such an important influence on his career. Dr. Whitaker, the Vicar
of Whalley, on the borders of Lancashire and Yorkshire, a wealthy and
learned antiquary, required some illustrations for his forthcoming
“History of the Parish of Whalley,” and Turner was recommended to him,
it is said by a Harrogate bookseller, as a young artist of fast-rising
reputation. It was during this visit that he made the acquaintance of
Mr. Walter Fawkes, the squire of Farnley, near Leeds, at whose
hospitable mansion, Farnley Hall, he was shortly to become a frequent
and an honoured guest.
* * * * *
It is time that reference should be made to the _sketches_, which form
such an important part of the volume of Turner’s work in water-colour.
From the outset of his career, on every journey, he made copious
studies--at first mainly in pencil, but sometimes in water-colour and
occasionally in crayon or oil--of every paintable spot he visited,
keeping usually a separate pocket-book for each tour. The sketches were
sometimes rapid, sometimes elaborate. Especially he made notes in colour
of skies, clouds, water, and any striking atmospheric effects which he
might chance to see. These although often slight, and usually swiftly
executed, were nevertheless singularly accurate. In a pocket-book of
1798 I find twenty-five such, with a list describing each:--_Twilight_,
_Clear_, _Rain Coming_, _Sunny_, _Crimsoned_, _Showery_, _Gathering
after Fog_, and so on. These sketches and studies he continued to make
and to store throughout his life, even up to his last journey on the
Continent in 1845. By the decision of the Court of Chancery, at the end
of a long litigation over his will, they were awarded--nineteen thousand
in all--to be the property of the nation, and after many years delay
they are now being admirably arranged and catalogued at the National
Gallery by Mr. Finberg, who writes on them here. It is needless to say
that to the student of Turner’s life work they are of the utmost
interest and importance, and often--especially the later ones--of
surpassing beauty. The examples which have recently (1908) been placed
on view in the National Gallery are mostly of Turner’s earlier periods,
but one or two belong to quite the close of his life; some are drawings
nearly finished but discarded.
In 1802 Turner visited the Continent for the first time. He was
naturally impressed with Calais, his first French town, and on his
return he painted the well-known picture of _Calais Pier_ (National
Gallery), and the still magnificent but now much darkened _Vintage at
Mâcon_ (the Earl of Yarborough). But it was in Switzerland, Savoy and
Piedmont that he spent most of his time, and the results may be seen in
the fine drawings of Bonneville, Chamounix, and the Lake of Geneva in
various collections, the _Falls of the Reichenbach_, the _Glacier and
Source of the Arveron_, and others at Farnley, and the superb large
body-colour sketches of _The Devil’s Bridge_ and the _St. Gothard Pass_,
in the portfolios of the National Gallery. Three of his Swiss drawings
he sent to the Royal Academy Exhibition of 1803.
From 1803 to 1812 he was continually receiving commissions, both for oil
pictures and water-colours, from influential patrons, including the
Earls of Egremont, Essex, Lonsdale, and Yarborough, Sir John Leicester,
Sir John Soane, and other wealthy amateurs. In 1807 he started his
well-known _Liber Studiorum_ in rivalry of the _Liber Veritatis_ of
Claude Lorraine, which had recently been successfully reproduced in
engraving by English publishers. For this he made about a hundred
drawings in sepia--a colour he rarely used elsewhere--as guides for the
professional engravers whom he employed on the work. Nearly all these
drawings, which are mostly slight, are now in the National Gallery.
During the ten years between 1803 and 1812, Turner’s style in
water-colour underwent a gradual, but a very considerable change. He
left the dark blues and deep golden browns which, as we have seen,
marked his first departure in 1797 from the “tinted manner” of his early
days, and he gradually adopted a lighter and more natural range of
colour. This new style is best seen in the work of what is known as his
“Yorkshire period,” which began about 1809, and continued, with various
developments, up to about 1820. His subjects were at first mainly taken
from the neighbourhood of the stately house in the beautiful valley of
the Wharfe which has become a place of pilgrimage to Turner students
from all parts of the world--I refer, of course, to Farnley Hall. Its
then owner, Mr. Walter Fawkes, was up to his death a kind friend and
liberal patron of the painter, who was a frequent visitor at the house,
and retained the friendship of the family down to his latest years.
Farnley Hall is still filled with drawings by Turner of its
surroundings, the neighbouring Wharfedale, important Swiss and other
foreign landscapes, illustrations to Scott’s and Byron’s Poems, studies
of birds, fish, etc. It also contains some important oil pictures by
him. To one series of water-colours--the “Rhine Sketches”--I shall have
occasion to refer later.
Ruskin admirably describes the characteristics of these ‘Yorkshire
drawings’ (“Modern Painters,” Vol. I., pp. 124, 125):--
“Of all his [Turner’s] drawings, I think those of the Yorkshire
series have the most heart in them, the most affectionate, simple,
unwearied serious finishings of truth. There is in them little
seeking after effect, but a strong love of place; little exhibition
of the artist’s own powers or peculiarities, but intense
appreciation of the smallest local minutiæ. These drawings have,
unfortunately, changed hands frequently, and have been abused and
ill-treated by picture-dealers and cleaners; the greater number are
now mere wrecks. I name them not as instances, but proofs of the
artist’s study in this district; for the affection to which they
owe their origin must have been grounded long years before....
“It is, I believe, to these broad, wooded steeps and swells of the
Yorkshire downs that we, in part, owe the singular massiveness that
prevails in Turner’s mountain drawing, and gives it one of its
chief elements of grandeur.... I am in the habit of looking to the
Yorkshire drawings as indicating one of the culminating points of
Turner’s career. In these he attained the highest degree of what he
had up to that time attempted, namely, finish and quantity of form,
united with expression of atmosphere, and light without colour. His
early drawings are singularly instructive in this definiteness and
simplicity of aim.” ... “Turner evidently felt that the claims upon
his regard possessed by those places which first had opened to him
the joy and the labour of his life could never be superseded. No
alpine cloud could efface, no Italian sunshine outshine the
memories of the pleasant days of Rokeby and Bolton; and many a
simple promontory dim with southern olive, many a lone cliff that
stooped unnoticed over some alien wave, was recorded by him with a
love and delicate care that were the shadows of old thoughts and
long-lost delights, whose charm yet hung like morning mist above
the chanting waves of Wharfe and Greta.”
From 1809 to 1820, Turner’s powers were rapidly developing, and he was
producing many important oil pictures, some of which--_The Frosty
Morning_, _Crossing the Brook_, _Somer Hill_, _Walton Bridges_ and _Raby
Castle_--were, perhaps, among the finest of his whole life. He was also
busy with drawings for engraving--chiefly for book illustrations, and
probably for this reason he seems to have executed comparatively few
water-colours for commissions or for sale. One, however, the magnificent
_Chryses_ (Mrs. T. Ashton), which he sent to the Royal Academy in 1811,
calls for notice. It is a large, impressive work, closely resembling in
design the _Glaucus and Scylla_ of the _Liber Studiorum_, but on a
broader and nobler scale; the colour-scheme intermediate between that of
his early and his middle time. What is so remarkable is its
extraordinary _Greek_ feeling. Colour apart, it at once recalls the
scenery and the sentiment of the Greek Islands, although Turner never in
his life saw them. Many will remember the effect which the drawing
produced in the Winter Exhibition of 1887 at Burlington House. Mr.
Morland Agnew’s beautiful _Scarborough_, reproduced here (Plate VIII.),
also belongs to this period.
One of Turner’s earliest series of book illustrations was his “Southern
Coast of England,” which he began about 1812 and continued to 1826. He
agreed with W. B. Cooke, a fine line-engraver and an enterprising
publisher, to supply forty drawings of views along the coast, from the
Nore on the east to the Bristol Channel on the west; many other leading
water-colour artists of the day--De Wint, Clennell, Prout, and
others--being also contributors. Turner was to receive seven and a half
guineas apiece for the drawings, which were of small size; but although
this price was soon raised to ten, and later to twelve guineas, he
became dissatisfied, and broke with Cooke, who, however, judging from
the correspondence, appears to have treated him fairly. He had,
moreover, given him many other commissions for drawings and had held
exhibitions of these, and the engravings from them, at his rooms in Soho
Square.
The Southern Coast drawings are elaborate, highly finished, and in a
rather warmer tone of colour than hitherto. Many are extremely
beautiful, but in some there is visible that crowding of lights and
foreground figures, which from this time onwards is not unfrequent in
Turner’s work. The majority of the drawings are now, alas, so faded as
to give but little idea of their pristine beauty. What they all were
like originally, may still be seen in the beautiful _Clovelly Bay_ in
the National Gallery of Ireland (Vaughan Bequest), and in the _Lulworth
Cove_ reproduced here (Plate IX.).
About the same time, Turner made a fine series of drawings, all on a
large scale, of the beautiful country which lies inland among the hills,
between Hastings and Tunbridge Wells. These were commissions from a
well-known and eccentric M.P., “Jack Fuller,” whose country-seat “Rose
Hall” (now known as “Brightling Park”) lies in the heart of that
neighbourhood. Four were effectively engraved as coloured aquatints, but
were never published; the rest were reproduced as Line Engravings in the
“Views of Hastings and its Vicinity” (afterwards called “Views in
Sussex”), published a few years later. The series remained for a long
time unbroken, but it was dispersed at Christie’s last year (1908). All
the “Sussex” drawings were of the highest quality, sober in colour and
treatment, as befitted the character of the scenery, but the majority
have been badly faded by long years of exposure to sunlight.
Somewhat similar in character to the “Southern Coast” drawings, but a
little later and even more highly finished, is a series which Turner
made in 1818-1819 from _camera obscura_ sketches by Hakewill, an
architect, to illustrate the latter’s “Picturesque Tour in Italy,”
published in 1820. Ruskin, who possessed many of these, ranked them very
highly and frequently alludes to them in “Modern Painters” and
elsewhere. In the “Notes on his Drawings by J. M. W. Turner, R.A.,
1878,” his last important work on art, he describes them (p. 22) as “a
series which expresses the mind of Turner in its consummate power, but
not yet in its widest range. Ordering to himself still the same limits
in method and aim, he reaches under these conditions the summit of
excellence, and of all these drawings there is but one criticism
possible--they ‘cannot be better done’.” By the kindness of Mr. Morland
Agnew, two of the “Hakewill” series, _The Lake of Nemi_ (Plate XI.) and
_Turin from the Superga_ (Plate XII.), are reproduced here.
In 1817 or 1818 Turner began the drawings which were to illustrate one
of his most famous works, the sumptuous “History of Richmondshire,”
which still admittedly remains the finest topographical book ever
published. The subjects--which were chosen for Turner by a local
committee of gentlemen--were all taken from that romantic district in
the North Riding of Yorkshire, on the borders of Lancashire and
Westmorland, of which the town of Richmond is the centre. The work was
to be the _magnum opus_ of Dr. Whitaker whose earlier Histories of
Whalley and Craven had also been illustrated by Turner, and his
publishers, Messrs. Longman, spared neither pains nor expense in its
production. Turner was paid twenty-five guineas each--then his usual
price--for the drawings, which are now worth from one to three thousand
guineas apiece. Although simple in style and in colouring as compared
with the work of his later years, they have pre-eminently the charm of
the ‘Yorkshire period’ already alluded to. The finest of the series,
_The Crook of the Lune_, is, by the courtesy of its owner, the Rev. W.
MacGregor, reproduced here (Plate XIII.). The necessary reduction in
size makes it difficult fully to appreciate the great beauty of this
drawing, which I regard as one of the most consummate works of Turner.
Although it must have been, one would imagine, a most intricate and
difficult subject for a painter, and notwithstanding that he has treated
it with extraordinary minuteness of detail--you can find at least twenty
different walks in it--yet all this wealth of exquisite detail is
perfectly subordinated to the unity and harmony of the composition as a
whole. The other “Richmondshire” drawings are scattered in various
collections; many, alas, are sadly faded from constant exposure to
light, notably the _Hornby Castle_, in the Victoria and Albert Museum,
which has become a complete wreck.
May I be permitted here to draw attention to the fact--apparently little
known, but none the less true--that, with the exception of some of the
darker early works, _no Turner drawing can be continuously exposed
unprotected to light, without its ruin being eventually only a question
of time_. The more delicate--the more “Turneresque” it is--the quicker
will that ruin be accomplished. Usually the fading is so gradual that
it is unnoticed by the owner, but it is certain, and, it need not be
added, the depreciation in value is equally certain. I would refer
anyone who thinks this an over-statement to the Blue Book on the
subject, published in 1888 (Report of the Science and Art Department on
the Action of Light on Water-Colours. H.M. Stationery Office, 1888).
Several striking object lessons of the effect of exposure may also be
seen at the National Gallery in Turner drawings which have been returned
after exhibition in provincial Galleries.