Masterpieces in Colour

Turner: Five letters and a postscript.

This beautiful sea piece is essentially Turnerthe result of his personal observation. It was painted after he had freed himself from the desire to rival and outvie his predecessors, and before he became obsessed by the passion to paint pure sunlight. "A Ship Aground" is a pendant to "The Old Chain Pier, Brighton," which also hangs in the Tate Gallery. Yes: I remember that morning at Exeter when I surprised you making a drawing of the west porch of the cathedral. Timidly were the unrestored figures of angels, apostles, prophets, kings and warriorsvery old, very batteredtaking form in your sketch-book:[Pg 12] timidly, for even then you were beginning to be troubled by the blur that rose, after an hour's work, between your eyes and the carven kings and saints. Your sister passed into the cathedral to her devotions carrying white flowers for the altar: we stayed in the sunlight. I cannot remember how Turner became the subject of our talk; but I think it was my mention of his drawing of the west front of Salisbury Cathedral done when he was twenty-threeone of the set exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1799, which hastened his election to an Associateship of the Royal Academy. Those were the days of the tinted architectural drawings, but in that magnificent Salisbury, the details indicated, yet not insistent, the old stones yellow in the sunshine, grey-blue in the shadow, Turner was already on the track of Light, the goal of his art life. He had not yet formulated any principle, that was not Turner's way; but those small, bright eyes of his had already perceived that there is light in shade as in shine. Girtin, that marvellous boy, his friend and fellow-student, was still alive; but art was in a poor[Pg 15] state in England, in 1799, and we can well believe that this drawing of Salisbury made Turner a marked man. I could dispense with the lamp-post boys playing with hoops, as indeed with every figure in every picture by Turner. But he needed such strong foreground notes, and he, like the older landscape painters, troubled little about figures. Claude used to say, with a laugh, that he made no charge for them. Their use was to throw back the middle distance. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 41694
Author: Hind, C. Lewis (Charles Lewis)
Release Date: Dec 23, 2012
Format: eBook
Language: English