Joseph Mallord William Turner An Idealised Italianate Landscape with Trees above a Lake or Bay, Lit by a Low Sun c.1828-9
Joseph Mallord William Turner,
An Idealised Italianate Landscape with Trees above a Lake or Bay, Lit by a Low Sun
c.1828-9
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
An Idealised Italianate Landscape with Trees above a Lake or Bay, Lit by a Low Sun c.1828–9
D25311
Turner Bequest CCLXIII 189
Turner Bequest CCLXIII 189
Watercolour on white wove paper, 312 x 439 mm
Watermark ‘T Edmonds 1825’
Inscribed in red ink ‘189’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIII – 189’ bottom right
Watermark ‘T Edmonds 1825’
Inscribed in red ink ‘189’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIII – 189’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Exhibition history
1934
Watercolours from the Turner Bequest [Loan Series A], Municipal Museum, Burton-on-Trent, September–December 1934, Public Museum, Wardown Park, Luton, January–February 1935, Manx Museum, Douglas, Isle of Man, August–November 1936, Towner Art Gallery, Eastbourne, January–March 1937, Historical Rooms, Todmorden, January–March 1938, Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield, September 1946–February 1947, Cannon Hall, Cawthorne, December 1959–April 1960, possibly transferred to Wakefield Art Gallery, February–April (no catalogue but frame no.13, as ‘Study for a Classical Landscape’).
1935
Drawings and Sketches by J.M.W. Turner, National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, December 1935–April 1936 (49, as ‘Study for a Classical Landscape’, c.1825–30).
1953
J.M.W. Turner R.A. 1775–1851: Pictures from Public and Private Collections in Great Britain, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, February–March 1953 (166, as ‘Study for a Classical Landscape’, c.1825–30).
1974
Turner 1775–1851, Royal Academy, London, November 1974–March 1975 (468, as ‘A Classical Landscape’, c.1828).
1975
Turner 1775–1851: zhivopis’, risunok, akvarel’, Hermitage Museum, Leningrad, October–November 1975, Pushkin Museum, Moscow, December 1975–January 1976 (55, as c.1828).
1976
William Turner und die Landschaft seiner Zeit, Hamburger Kunsthalle, May–July 1976 (97, as ‘Klassische Landscaft’, c.1828 reproduced).
1978
Turner 1775–1851, Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague, December 1978–February 1979 (54, as ‘A classical landscape’, reproduced).
1979
Exposicion del gran pintor ingles, William Turner: Oleos y acuarelas: Collecciones de la Tate Gallery, British Museum y otros museos ingleses, Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City, August–September 1979 (BM52, as ‘Paisaje clásico’).
1979
Oleos y acuarelas de Joseph Mallord William Turner, Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas, Venezuela, October[–?November] 1979 (BM 52, as ‘Un paisaje clasico’).
1991
Turner: The Fourth Decade: Watercolours 1820–1830, Tate Gallery, London, January–May 1991 (86, as ‘Study of a Classical Landscape: ?Lake Maggiore’, c.1828–30, reproduced).
2000
Pure as Italian Air: Turner and Claude Lorrain, Tate Britain, London, November 2000–April 2001 (no catalogue).
2002
Turner et le Lorrain, Musée des beaux-arts, Nancy, December 2002–March 2003 (80, as ‘Study of a Classical Landscape, possibly Arona, Lago Maggiore’, c.1828–30, reproduced in colour).
2007
Hockney on Turner Watercolours, Tate Britain, London, June 2007–February 2008 (no number, as ‘Study of a Classical Landscape: ?Lake Maggiore’, c.1828–30, reproduced in colour).
References
1905
E.T. Cook, Hidden Treasures of the National Gallery. A Selection of Studies and Drawings by J.M.W. Turner, R.A. Now Published for the First Time. With Some Account of Them. With a Sketch of Turner’s Life, and Reproductions of a Number of his Finished Works, London 1905, reproduced p.66, as ‘Study for an Italian Composition’.
1820
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.II, p.829, CCLXIII 189, as ‘An Italian scene’, c.1820–30.
1825
D. Kighley Baxandall, Drawings and Sketches by J.M.W. Turner, exhibition catalogue, National Museum of Wales, Cardiff 1935, p.19 no.49, as ‘Study for a Classical Landscape’, c.1825–30.
1825
Bryan Robertson and Sir John Rothenstein, J.M.W. Turner R.A. 1775–1851: An Exhibition of Pictures from Public and Private Collections in Great Britain, exhibition catalogue, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London 1953, p.26 no.166, as ‘Study for a Classical Landscape’, c.1825–30.
1828
Andrew Wilton in Martin Butlin, Wilton and John Gage, Turner 1775–1851, exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy, London 1974, p.130 no.468, as ‘A Classical Landscape’, c.1828.
1975
Andrew Wilton, Turner in the British Museum: Drawings and Watercolours, exhibition catalogue, Department of Prints and Drawings, British Museum, London 1975, p.124 under no.201.
1828
Graham Reynolds, Turner 1775–1851: zhivopis’, risunok, akvarel’, exhibition catalogue, Hermitage Museum, Leningrad 1975, p.38 no.55, as c.1828.
1828
Werner Hofmann, Andrew Wilton, Siegmar Hosten and others, William Turner und die Landschaft seiner Zeit, exhibition catalogue, Hamburger Kunsthalle 1976, p.146 no.97, as ‘Klassische Landscaft’, c.1828, reproduced.
1977
Andrew Wilton, Turner Watercolors: An Exhibition of Works Loaned by The Trustees of the British Museum, exhibition catalogue, Cleveland Museum of Art 1977, p.40 under no.21.
1978
John Sillevis, Nini Jonker and Hripsimé Visser, Turner 1775–1851, exhibition catalogue, Haags Gemeentemuseum, The Hague 1978, p.79 no.554, as ‘A classical landscape’, reproduced.
1979
John Gage, Exposicion del gran pintor ingles, William Turner: Oleos y acuarelas: Collecciones de la Tate Gallery, British Museum y otros museos ingleses, exhibition catalogue, Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City 1979, reproduced p.39, p.61 no.BM52, as ‘Paisaje clásico’.
1979
John Gage and Ana T. de Gradowska, Oleos y acuarelas de Joseph Mallord William Turner, exhibition catalogue, Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas, Venezuela 1979, p.[24] no.BM 52, as ‘Un paisaje clasico’.
1828
Ian Warrell, Turner: The Fourth Decade: Watercolours 1820–1830, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1991, p.70 no.86, as ‘Study of a Classical Landscape: ?Lake Maggiore’, c.1828–30, reproduced.
1997
Eric Shanes, Turner’s Watercolour Explorations 1810–1842, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1997, pp.94 Appendix I ‘Devonshire’, 96 Appendix I ‘England and Wales Series’, 97 Appendix I ‘France’, 98 Appendix I ‘Italy’.
1828
Ian Warrell in Warrell, Blandine Chavanne and Michael Kitson, Turner et le Lorrain, exhibition catalogue, Musée des beaux-arts, Nancy 2002, p.155 no.80, reproduced in colour, p.198, as ‘Study of a Classical Landscape, possibly Arona, Lago Maggiore’, c.1828–30.
1828
David Blayney Brown, Turner Watercolours, exhibition catalogue, Tate Britain, London 2007, p.82, as ‘Study of a Classical Landscape: ?Lake Maggiore’, c.1828–30, reproduced in colour.
1828
Simon Grant (ed.) and David Blayney Brown, Hockney on Turner Watercolours, exhibition catalogue, Tate Britain, London 2007, p.38, as ‘Study of a Classical Landscape: Lake Maggiore’, c.1828–30, reproduced in colour.
This serene, luminous landscape with trees overlooking buildings and a stretch of water, which may represent a lake or coastal bay, has been tentatively connected by Ian Warrell to the watercolour Arona, Lago Maggiore of about 1828 (private collection),1 engraved for The Keepsake in 1829 (Tate impression: T05106).2 The similarities lie in the light-filled atmosphere and the combination of trees in the foreground, buildings in the middle distance and water and shore beyond, although the finished watercolour shows these in a significantly different arrangement.
Andrew Wilton has offered widely different identifications or comparisons across the range of Turner’s idealising mode in the manner of Claude Lorrain (see the introduction to this subsection),3 while Eric Shanes has suggested locations across North Devon,4 Normandy5 and the Mediterranean coast along the Riviera6 or around Genoa.7 While a specific connection to the Arona view cannot be confirmed, the present work is dated here to about the time of Turner’s 1828–9 tour of Italy,8 which had been preceded by work on various Italian views for The Keepsake.9
Compare the Claude-like central sun and contre-jour effect in Tate D25446 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII 323).
Technical notes:
The sun was reserved as bare paper within the surrounding yellow washes. The blue horizon was drawn freehand with a fine brush, without a pencil guideline.
Tate D25302 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII 180), a comparable subject, was painted on another sheet of Edmonds’s paper from 1825.
Verso:
Blank; rubbed and darkened overall. Inscribed in pencil ‘CCLXIII | 189’ bottom right; stamped in black with Turner Bequest monogram over ‘CCLXIII – 189’ towards bottom left.
Matthew Imms
August 2016
How to cite
Matthew Imms, ‘An Idealised Italianate Landscape with Trees above a Lake or Bay, Lit by a Low Sun c.1828–9 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2017, https://www