Joseph Mallord William Turner Study for 'A Hurricane in the Desert (The Simoom)', Rogers's 'Poems' c.1830-2
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Joseph Mallord William Turner,
Study for 'A Hurricane in the Desert (The Simoom)', Rogers's 'Poems'
c.1830-2
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Study for ‘A Hurricane in the Desert (The Simoom)’, Rogers’s ‘Poems’ circa 1830–2
D27578
Turner Bequest CCLXXX 61
Turner Bequest CCLXXX 61
Pencil and watercolour, approximately 112 x 135 mm on off-white machine-made cartridge paper, 180 x 227 mm
Inscribed by ?the artist in pencil with two lines on right and bottom side of sheet
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘(61’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXXX 61’ bottom right
Inscribed by ?the artist in pencil with two lines on right and bottom side of sheet
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘(61’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCLXXX 61’ bottom right
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Exhibition history
2007
Turner Hugo Moreau: Entdeckung der Abstraktion, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, October 2007–January 2008 (85, reproduced in colour, as ‘Preparatory Study: Storm, for Campbell’s “Poetical Works”, 1837’).
References
1909
A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings in the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.II, p.894, as ‘... very slight. Possibly for Campbell’s Poems’.
1993
Jan Piggott, Turner’s Vignettes, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1993, p.95 as ‘Preparatory Study: Storm’.
1999
Peter Bower, Turner’s Later Papers: A Study of the Manufacture, Selection and Use of his Drawing Papers 1820–1851, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1999, p.59.
2007
Max Hollein and Raphael Rosenberg, Turner Hugo Moreau: Entdeckung der Abstraktion, exhibition catalogue, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt 2007, no.85, pp.122, 149 reproduced (colour), as ‘Preparatory Study: Storm, for Campbell’s “Poetical Works”, 1837’.
This previously unidentified watercolour study appears to be a preparatory sketch for the vignette, The Simoom, which Turner designed as an illustration to Samuel Rogers’s poem ‘Human Life’ (see Tate D27712; Turner Bequest CCLXXX 195). The study reflects the dramatic vortical composition and dark palette of the finished design, with the pale disc of the sun shining bleakly amidst the stormy sky in the background.
This is one of two potential studies for The Simoom in the Turner Bequest (see also Tate D27582; Turner Bequest CCLXXX 65). Jan Piggott has previously compared both sketches to Hohenlinden circa 1835 (National Gallery of Scotland),1 a later vignette subject for Thomas Campbell’s Poetical Works (1837).2
This work was part of a parcel of studies described by John Ruskin as ‘A.B. 40. PO. Vignette beginnings, once on a roll. Worthless’.3 For an explanation of his meaning for ‘once on a roll’ see the technical notes above. Finberg records how Ruskin later described his phrasing in a letter to Ralph Nicholson Wornum as ‘horrible’, adding ‘I never meant it to be permanent’.4
Technical notes:
Peter Bower has noted that this study is made on off-white low-grade machine-made cartridge paper. The maker is unknown and there is no watermark. This paper would have been relatively cheap to buy and could have been purchased from a colourman, cut off from a roll to the desired size. Turner has used the ‘felt’ side of the paper which has slightly more texture than the ‘wire’ side, allowing better adhesion of pigment and graphite to the surface of the sheet. Many of Turner’s vignette studies were made on a similar grade of machine-made paper, and the artist employed the ‘felt’ side on all of them.1
Peter Bower has noted that this study is made on off-white low-grade machine-made cartridge paper. The maker is unknown and there is no watermark. This paper would have been relatively cheap to buy and could have been purchased from a colourman, cut off from a roll to the desired size. Turner has used the ‘felt’ side of the paper which has slightly more texture than the ‘wire’ side, allowing better adhesion of pigment and graphite to the surface of the sheet. Many of Turner’s vignette studies were made on a similar grade of machine-made paper, and the artist employed the ‘felt’ side on all of them.1
Verso:
Inscribed by an unknown hand in pencil ‘AB 40 P’ and ‘O’ bottom right and ‘D27578’ bottom right
Meredith Gamer
August 2006
How to cite
Meredith Gamer, ‘Study for ‘A Hurricane in the Desert (The Simoom)’, Rogers’s ‘Poems’ c.1830–2 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2006, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www