J.M.W. Turner
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Natural History c.1820-4
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Artwork
Joseph Mallord William Turner Study of Fish: Two Tench, a Trout and a Perch c.1822-4
Joseph Mallord William Turner,
Study of Fish: Two Tench, a Trout and a Perch
c.1822-4
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Study of Fish: Two Tench, a Trout and a Perch c.1822–4
D25462
Turner Bequest CCLXIII 339
Turner Bequest CCLXIII 339
Pencil, watercolour and gouache on white wove paper, 275 x 470 mm
Partial watermark ‘J Whatman | Turkey Mill | 1821’ (see technical notes in main catalogue entry)
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIII 339’ bottom right
Partial watermark ‘J Whatman | Turkey Mill | 1821’ (see technical notes in main catalogue entry)
Blind-stamped with Turner Bequest monogram bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXIII 339’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Exhibition history
1878
National Gallery, London, various dates, 1878–1904 (373, as ‘Study of Fish (Trout etc.)’).
1953
Display of Watercolours from the Turner Bequest, Tate Gallery, London, January 1953–April 1959 (no catalogue).
1972
J.M.W. Turner: Gemälde Aquarelle, Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museen Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, September–November 1972 (65).
1974
Turner 1775–1851, Royal Academy, London, November 1974–March 1975 (271).
1975
Turner 1775–1851: zhivopis', risunok, akvarel', Hermitage Museum, Leningrad, October–November 1975, Pushkin Museum, Moscow, December 1975–January 1976 (24).
1976
William Turner und die Landschaft seiner Zeit, Hamburger Kunsthalle, May–July 1976 (62).
1976
J.M.W. Turner 1775–1851: Akvareller og Tegninger fra British Museum, Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen, February–May 1976 (32).
1978
Watercolours from the Turner Bequest, Lent by the British Museum, Tate Gallery, London, January–June 1978 (no catalogue).
1980
Turner at the Bankside Gallery: Drawings & Water-colours of British River Scenes from the British Museum, Bankside Gallery, London, November–December 1980 (70).
1984
Turner’s Tour of Richmondshire/Yorkshire: In Turner’s Footsteps through the Hills and Dales of Northern England, Tate Gallery, London, July–December 1984 (no catalogue).
1991
Turner: The Fourth Decade: Watercolours 1820–1830, Tate Gallery, London, January–May 1991 (3).
1993
The Great Age of British Watercolours, 1750–1880, Royal Academy of Arts, London, January–April 1993, National Gallery of Art, Washington, May–July (290, reproduced in colour).
1999
L’Age d’or de l’aquarelle anglaise: 1770–1900, Fondation de l’Hermitage, Lausanne, January–May 1999 (35, reproduced in colour).
2006
Turner and the Natural World, Tate Britain, London, April–October 2006 (no catalogue).
2007
John Soane & JMW Turner: Illuminating a Friendship, Sir John Soane’s Museum, London, January–May 2007 (3, reproduced in colour).
2009
Water Colours: From the Source to the Sea, Tate Britain, London, August 2009–July 2010 (no catalogue).
2015
Turner’s Wessex: Architecture and Ambition, The Salisbury Museum, 22 May–27 September 2015 (fig. 176, reproduced in colour).
References
1904
E. T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn (eds.), Library Edition: The Works of John Ruskin: Volume XIII: Turner: The Harbours of England; Catalogues and Notes, London 1904, pp.370, 626, no.373.
1909
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.II, p.840, CCLXIII 339, as ‘Study of fish (trout, &c.)’.
1972
Werner Haftmann, Andrew Wilton, Henning Bock and others, J.M.W. Turner: Gemälde Aquarelle, exhibition catalogue, Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museen Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, September–November 1972, p.120 no.65, p.123 under no.91.
1973
Turner {1775 / 1851}: desenhos, aguarelas e óleos / Drawings, Watercolours and Oil Paintings, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon, June–July 1973, p.77 no.24.
1974
Martin Butlin, Andrew Wilton and John Gage, Turner 1775–1851, exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy, London 1974, p.98 no 271, pp.98, 140 under nos. 269, 507.
1975
Joseph R. Goldyne, J.M.W. Turner: Works on Paper from American Collections, exhibition catalogue, University Art Museum, Berkeley, California 1975, p.110 under no.123.
1975
Graham Reynolds, Turner 1775–1851: zhivopis', risunok, akvarel', exhibition catalogue, Hermitage Museum, Leningrad 1975, p. 30 no.24.
1976
Werner Hofmann, Andrew Wilton, Siegmar Hosten and others, William Turner und die Landschaft seiner Zeit, exhibition catalogue, Hamburger Kunsthalle 1976, p.128 no.62.
1976
David Loshak and Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner 1775–1851: Akvareller og Tegninger fra British Museum, exhibition catalogue, Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen 1976, p.46 no.32.
1979
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.468 preceding no.1399.
1980
Michael Spender and Malcolm Fry, Turner at the Bankside Gallery: Catalogue of an Exhibition of Drawings & Water-colours of British River Scenes from the British Museum, exhibition catalogue, Bankside Gallery, London 1980, p.151 no.70.
1986
Haruki Yaegashi, Martin Butlin, Evelyn Joll and others, Turner Exhibition, exhibition catalogue, National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo 1986, p.262 under no.108.
1988
Anne Lyles, Turner and Natural History: The Farnley Project, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1988, pp.39, 41, 64 no. 51, ill.34 (colour).
1991
Ian Warrell, Turner: The Fourth Decade: Watercolours 1820–1830, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1991, p.26 no.3.
1993
Andrew Wilton and Anne Lyles, The Great Age of British Watercolours 1750–1880, exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy of Arts, London 1993, p.161 no.290, pl.146 (colour).
1997
Eric Shanes, Turner’s Watercolour Explorations 1810–1842, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1997, pp.31, 97.
1999
William Hauptman, L’Age d’or de l’aquarelle anglaise: 1770–1900, exhibition catalogue, Fondation de l’Hermitage, Lausanne 1999, pp.80–1 no.35 (incorrectly cited as ‘D25467’).
2001
James Hamilton, ‘Fishing’, in Evelyn Joll, Martin Butlin and Luke Herrmann (eds.), The Oxford Companion to J.M.W. Turner, Oxford 2001, p.110.
2004
Christopher Wynne, J.M.W. Turner, Lifelines, Munich, London and New York 2004, reproduced in colour p.24.
2005
Peter Ackroyd, J.M.W. Turner, Brief Lives, London 2005, p.47.
2007
Helen Dorey, John Soane & JMW Turner: Illuminating a Friendship, exhibition catalogue, Sir John Soane’s Museum, London 2007, p.21 no. 3, reproduced in colour.
2010
Nicola Moorby and Ian Warrell (eds.), How to Paint like Turner, London 2010, p.26, reproduced p.27.
2015
Ian Warrell, Turner’s Wessex: Architecture and Ambition, exhibition catalogue, Scala, London 2015, reproduced in colour p.179.
This sheet includes four studies of fish worked up with watercolour, the surrounding sketchy pencil lines revealing something of Turner’s working process. The individual characteristics of the different species of fish shown are drawn out in part through the colour palette: the more opaque appearance of the silvery-brown tench with their duller colouring is shown in contrast to the lightly handled trout and perch, which are enlivened with reds and a bluish sheen.
Turner is known to have spent time fishing at locations including Tabley House, Farnley Hall and Petworth. At Farnley, the Yorkshire home of his friend and patron Walter Fawkes, he made bird studies for a natural history project being compiled there: the Ornithological Collection (for more information about this project, see the introduction to this section). Anne Lyles has suggested that these closely observed studies of fish might also have been made at Farnley. Fawkes’s four-volume Synopsis of Natural History (1823) included a survey of fish, reflecting a keen interest in the subject. However, this was illustrated by Samuel Howitt (like Turner, a contributor to the Ornithological Collection).1 Ian Warrell has proposed the watercolour might instead relate to Hathersage in Derbyshire, the home of Turner’s friend James Holworthy, with whom he corresponded about fishing during this period.2
The study is thought to date from the early 1820s and cannot be earlier than 1821 due to the presence of a watermark from that year. It and a related preparatory study (Tate D25461; Turner Bequest CCLXIII 338) are perhaps, therefore, a little later than Turner’s bird drawings for the Ornithological Collection (Leeds City Art Gallery), which are usually dated c.1815–20. However, as Lyles has written, there is a stylistic affinity between the fish and bird studies in this section of the catalogue and those works certainly made for the Ornithological Collection3, suggesting that they date from around the same time.
See also the introduction to this section and the entry for D25520 (Turner Bequest CCLXIII a 5).
Technical notes:
The sheet was originally larger; the left part of the sheet, which includes a faint pencil drawing of an additional fish’s head as well as most of the paper’s watermark, was cut away by John Ruskin, but survives as a separate sheet in the Turner Bequest (Tate D25520; Turner Bequest CCLXIII a 5). A horizontal pencil line running along the top of both this and the other sheet suggest that both were cut down from a still larger sheet, possibly also by Ruskin.
Verso:
Blank; inscribed in pencil ‘88’, upper right and ‘CCLXIII. 339’, bottom centre; stamped in black ‘CCLXIII–339’ bottom left.
Elizabeth Jacklin
September 2016
How to cite
Elizabeth Jacklin, ‘Study of Fish: Two Tench, a Trout and a Perch c.1822–4 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2016, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, July 2017, https://www