J. M. W. Turner#Legacy

{{Infobox artist

| name = J. M. W. Turner

| honorific_suffix = {{post-nominals|country=GBR|RA|size=100%}}

| image = Joseph Mallord William Turner auto-retrato.jpg

| image_size = 220

| caption = Self-Portrait, oil on canvas, {{circa|1799}}

| birth_name = Joseph Mallord William Turner

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1775|04|23|df=y}}

| birth_place = London, England

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1851|12|19|1775|04|23|df=yes}}

| death_place = London, England

| field = Paintings

| training = Royal Academy of Arts

| movement = Romanticism

| patrons =

| resting_place = St Paul's Cathedral

| notable_works = {{Unbulleted list|The Fighting Temeraire|Rain, Steam and Speed}}

| module = {{Infobox person|child=yes

| signature = William turner.svg}}

}}

Joseph Mallord William Turner {{Post-nominals|post-noms=RA}} (23 April 1775{{snd}}19 December 1851), known in his time as William Turner,{{efn|Although Turner was known by his middle name, William, he is now generally referred to by his initials, in order to avoid confusion with the artist William Turner (1789–1862).}} was an English Romantic painter, printmaker and watercolourist. He is known for his expressive colouring, imaginative landscapes and turbulent, often violent marine paintings. His artistic style developed over his lifetime, moving away from Romanticism — bypassing the following rising style of Realism — and, instead, with his later works being a significant precursor of and presaging the later Impressionist and Abstract Art movements that arose in the decades after his death.{{cite book |title= Biographical Encyclopedia |publisher= Cambridge University Press |editor=David Crystal|year=1998 |edition=2nd |isbn=978-0-521-63099-3 |language=en |page=943}} He left behind more than 550 oil paintings, 2,000 watercolours, and 30,000 works on paper.{{cite web |title=Turner Society Homepage |url=http://www.turnersociety.org.uk/ |access-date=27 November 2011}} He was championed by the leading English art critic John Ruskin from 1840, and is today regarded as having elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivaling history painting.{{cite magazine| quote=At the turn of the 18th century, history painting was the highest purpose art could serve, and Turner would attempt those heights all his life. But his real achievement would be to make landscape the equal of history painting.| last=Lacayo| first=Richard| title=The Sunshine Boy| magazine=Time| url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1670528,00.html| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071012172424/http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1670528,00.html| url-status=dead| archive-date=12 October 2007| date=11 October 2007}}

Turner was born in Maiden Lane, Covent Garden, London, to a modest lower-middle-class family and retained his lower-class accent, while assiduously avoiding the trappings of success and fame. A child prodigy, Turner studied at the Royal Academy of Arts from 1789, enrolling when he was 14, and exhibited his first work there at 15. During this period, he also served as an architectural draftsman. He earned a steady income from commissions and sales, which he often only begrudgingly accepted owing to his troubled and contrary nature. He opened his own gallery in 1804 and became professor of perspective at the academy in 1807, where he lectured until 1828. He travelled around Europe from 1802, typically returning with voluminous sketchbooks.

Intensely private, eccentric, and reclusive, Turner was a controversial figure throughout his career. He did not marry, but fathered two daughters, Evelina (1801–1874) and Georgiana (1811–1843), by the widow Sarah Danby. He became more pessimistic and morose as he got older, especially after the death of his father in 1829; when his outlook deteriorated, his gallery fell into disrepair and neglect, and his art intensified. In 1841, Turner rowed a boat into the Thames so he could not be counted as present at any property in that year's census.{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51474049|title=census|website=BBC |access-date=14 February 2020}} He lived in squalor and poor health from 1845, and died in London in 1851 aged 76. Turner is buried in St Paul's Cathedral, London."Memorials of St Paul's Cathedral" Sinclair, W. p. 468: London; Chapman & Hall, Ltd; 1909.

Biography

= Childhood =

File:DV307 no.70 House where Turner was born, from a print.png where Turner was born, {{circa}}1850s]]

There are reasons to question the accepted location and birth date for Turner:

" He sometimes talked of being born in the same year as Napolean and the Duke of Wellington"{{Cite book |last=Thornbury |first=Walter |title=The Life of J M W Turner Founded on the papers furnished by his friends and fellow acadamicians Vol 2 |date=1862 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=https://archive.org/details/lifeofjmwturnerr01thor/page/3/mode/1up?view=theater |pages=4}} This would put Turner's birth date as 1769.

"The assertion, therefore, of some writer (Mr. Cyrus Redding, in Fraser?), that Turner used to say that he came up from Devonshire to London when he was very young,"{{Cite book |last=Thornbury |first=Walter |title=The Life of J. M. W. Turner Founded on Letters and Papers Furnished by his Friends and Fellow Academicians Vol 2 |date=1862 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=https://archive.org/details/lifeofjmwturnerr01thor/page/n25/mode/1up?view=theater |pages=3}}

Turner's father William Turner (1745–1829) moved to London around 1770 from South Molton, Devon.

Joseph Mallord William Turner was born on 23 April 1775 and baptised on 14 May.{{efn|Turner claimed to have been born on 23 April 1775, which is both Saint George's Day and the supposed birthday of William Shakespeare, but this claim has never been verified. The first verifiable date is that Turner was baptised on 14 May, and some authors doubt the 23 April date on the grounds that high infant mortality rates meant that parents usually baptised their children shortly after birth.{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|p=8}}}} He was born in Maiden Lane, Covent Garden, in London.{{cite book| last=Shanes| first=Eric |author-link=Eric Shanes| title=The life and masterworks of J.M.W. Turner| year=2008| publisher=Parkstone Press| location=New York| isbn=978-1-85995-681-6| edition=4th}} His father was a barber and wig maker.{{cite ODNB| title=Joseph Mallord William Turner| url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/27854| first=Luke| last=Herrmann| date=October 2006| doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/27854}} His mother, Mary Marshall, came from a family of butchers.{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|loc=Chapter 1}} A younger sister, Mary Ann, was born in September 1778 but died in August 1783.{{cite book| last=Bailey| first=Anthony| title=Standing in the sun: a life of J.M.W. Turner| year=1998 |publisher=Pimlico| location=London| isbn=0-7126-6604-4| page=8| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XGxIAQAAIAAJ&q=mary+ann}} {{subscription required|s}}

Turner's mother showed signs of mental disturbance from 1785 and was admitted to St Luke's Hospital for Lunatics in Old Street in 1799. She was moved in 1800 to Bethlem Hospital,{{cite book |last1=Brown |first1=David Blayney |chapter=Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851 |title=J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours |editor1-first=David Blayney |editor1-last=Brown |chapter-url=http://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-1775-1851-r1141041 |url=http://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner |publisher=Tate Research Publications |isbn=978-1-84976-386-8 |date=December 2012 |access-date=10 March 2016}} a mental asylum, where she died in 1804.{{efn|Her illness was possibly due in part to the early death of Turner's younger sister. Hamilton suggests that this "fit of illness" may have been an early sign of her madness.{{Citation needed|reason=full citation of ref Hamilton needed|date=May 2019}}}} Turner was sent{{when|date=March 2025}} to his maternal uncle, Joseph Mallord William Marshall, a butcherTurner in his Time, Andrew Wilton, H. N. Abrams Books, 1987, p. 45{{Cite web|url=https://brentfordandchiswicklhs.org.uk/m-w-turner-connections-with-brentford-by-carolyn-hammond/|title=] M W Turner – Connections with Brentford by Carolyn Hammond | Brentford & Chiswick Local History Society}} in Brentford, then a small town on the banks of the River Thames west of London, where Turner attended school. The earliest known artistic exercise by Turner is from this period—a series of simple colourings of engraved plates from Henry Boswell's Picturesque View of the Antiquities of England and Wales.{{cite book| last=Wilton| first=Andrew| title=Turner in his time| year=2006| publisher=Thames & Hudson| location=London| isbn=978-0-500-23830-1| page=14| edition=New}}

Around 1786, Turner was sent to Margate on the north-east Kent coast. There he produced a series of drawings of the town and surrounding area that foreshadowed his later work.{{cite book| last=Wilton| first=Andrew| title=Turner in his time| year=2006|publisher=Thames & Hudson| location=London| isbn=978-0-500-23830-1| page=15| edition=New}} By this time, Turner's drawings were being exhibited in his father's shop window and sold for a few shillings.{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|loc=Chapter 1}} His father boasted to the artist Thomas Stothard that: "My son, sir, is going to be a painter".{{cite book| last=Thornbury| first=George Walter| title=The life of J.M.W. Turner| year=1862| page=8| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oWIBAAAAQAAJ}} In 1789, Turner again stayed with his uncle who had retired to Sunningwell (now part of Oxfordshire). A whole sketchbook of work from this time in Berkshire survives as well as a watercolour of Oxford. The use of pencil sketches on location, as the foundation for later finished paintings, formed the basis of Turner's essential working style for his whole career.

Many early sketches by Turner were architectural studies or exercises in perspective, and it is known that, as a young man, he worked for several architects including Thomas Hardwick, James Wyatt and Joseph Bonomi the Elder.{{cite book| last=Hamilton| first=James| title=Turner : a life| year=1997| publisher=Sceptre| location=London| isbn=0-340-62811-1| chapter=1}} By the end of 1789, he had also begun to study under the topographical draughtsman Thomas Malton, who specialised in London views. Turner learned from him the basic tricks of the trade, copying and colouring outline prints of British castles and abbeys. He would later call Malton "My real master".{{cite book| last=Thornbury| first=George Walter| title=The life of J.M.W. Turner| year=1862| page=27| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oWIBAAAAQAAJ}} Topography was a thriving industry by which a young artist could pay for his studies.

= Career =

File:Caerlaverock Castle by Joseph Mallord William Turner - Joseph Mallord William Turner - ABDAG000623.jpg

File:Joseph Mallord William Turner (British - Modern Rome-Campo Vaccino - Google Art Project.jpg, 1839]]

Turner entered the Royal Academy of Art in 1789, aged 14,{{cite book| last=Finberg| first=A. J.| title=The Life of J.M.W. Turner, R.A| url=https://archive.org/details/lifeofjmwturnerr0000finb| url-access=registration| publisher=Clarendon Press| year=1961| page=[https://archive.org/details/lifeofjmwturnerr0000finb/page/17 17]}} and was accepted into the academy a year later by Sir Joshua Reynolds. He showed an early interest in architecture but was advised by Hardwick to focus on painting. His first watercolour, A View of the Archbishop's Palace, Lambeth, was accepted for the Royal Academy summer exhibition of 1790 when Turner was 15.

As an academy probationer, Turner was taught drawing from plaster casts of antique sculptures. From July 1790 to October 1793, his name appears in the registry of the academy over a hundred times.{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|loc=Chapter 2}} In June 1792, he was admitted to the life class to learn to draw the human body from nude models.{{cite book| last=Wilton| first=Andrew| title=Turner in his time| year=2006| publisher=Thames & Hudson| location=London| isbn=978-0-500-23830-1| page=17| edition=New}} Turner exhibited watercolours each year at the academy while painting in the winter and travelling in the summer widely throughout Britain, particularly to Wales, where he produced a wide range of sketches for working up into studies and watercolours. These particularly focused on architectural work, which used his skills as a draughtsman.{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|loc=Chapter 2}} In 1793, he showed the oil titled The Rising Squall – Hot Wells from St Vincent's Rock Bristol (lost until 2024), which foreshadowed his later climatic effects.{{cite book| last=Wilton| first=Andrew| title=Turner in his time| year=2006| publisher=Thames & Hudson| location=London| isbn=978-0-500-23830-1| page=20| edition=New}}{{Cite web |date=2025-06-06 |title=One of JMW Turner's first paintings rediscovered after 150 years |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clyzp4r70m8o |access-date=2025-06-06 |website=BBC News |language=en-GB}} The British writer Peter Cunningham, in his obituary of Turner, wrote that it was: "recognised by the wiser few as a noble attempt at lifting landscape art out of the tame insipidities ... [and] evinced for the first time that mastery of effect for which he is now justly celebrated".{{cite news| last=Cunningham| first=Peter| title=Obituary of Turner| newspaper=The Athenaeum| date=27 December 1851| pages=17–18}}

File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - Fishermen at Sea - Google Art Project.jpg, exhibited in 1796, the first oil painting exhibited by Turner at the Royal Academy]]

In 1796, Turner exhibited Fishermen at Sea, a nocturnal moonlit scene of the Needles off the Isle of Wight, an image of boats in peril.{{cite book| last=Butlin| first=Martin| title=The paintings of J.M.W. Turner| year=1984| publisher=Yale University Press| location=New Haven| isbn=978-0-300-03276-5 |edition=Rev.| author2=Joll, Evelyn}} Wilton said that the image was "a summary of all that had been said about the sea by the artists of the 18th century"{{cite book| last=Wilton| first=Andrew| title=Turner in his time| year=2006| publisher=Thames & Hudson| location=London| isbn=978-0-500-23830-1|page=27|edition=New }} and shows strong influence by artists such as Claude Joseph Vernet, Philip James de Loutherbourg, Peter Monamy and Francis Swaine, who was admired for his moonlight marine paintings. The image was praised by contemporary critics and founded Turner's reputation as both an oil painter and a painter of maritime scenes.{{cite book| last=Wilton| first=Andrew| title=Turner in his time| year=2006| publisher=Thames & Hudson| location=London| isbn=978-0-500-23830-1| page=28| edition=New}}

File:Portrait of J. M. W. Turner, R.A. making his sketch for the celebrated picture of Mercury & Argus (4674619).jpg, {{circa}}1840, Portrait of J. M. W. Turner, making his sketch for the celebrated picture of 'Mercury & Argus' (exhibited in 1836)]]

Turner travelled widely in Europe, starting with France and Switzerland in 1802 and studying in the Louvre in Paris in the same year. He made many visits to Venice. Important support for his work came from Walter Ramsden Fawkes of Farnley Hall, near Otley in Yorkshire, who became a close friend of the artist. Turner first visited Otley in 1797, aged 22, when commissioned to paint watercolours of the area. He was so attracted to Otley and the surrounding area that he returned to it throughout his career. The stormy backdrop of Snow Storm: Hannibal and his Army Crossing the Alps is reputed to have been inspired by a storm over the Chevin in Otley while he was staying at Farnley Hall.

Turner was a frequent guest of George Wyndham, 3rd Earl of Egremont, at Petworth House in West Sussex, and painted scenes that Egremont funded taken from the grounds of the house and of the Sussex countryside, including a view of the Chichester Canal. Petworth House still displays 20 paintings, the largest collection of his work outside the Tate.{{cite web |title=Petworth Park through Turner's eyes |url=https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/visit/sussex/petworth/petworth-park-through-turners-eyes |website=National Trust |access-date=15 March 2025}}

= Later life =

As Turner grew older, he became more eccentric. He had few close friends except for his father, who lived with him for 30 years and worked as his studio assistant. His father's death in 1829 had a profound effect on him, and thereafter he was subject to bouts of depression. He never married but had a relationship with an older widow, his housekeeper Sarah Danby. He is believed to have been the father of her two daughters Evelina Dupuis and Georgiana Thompson.{{cite book| last=Roberts| first=Miquette| title=The Unknown Turner| url=http://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-1775-1851-r1141041| publisher=Tate|access-date=14 July 2014| isbn=978-1-84976-386-8| date=5 December 2012}} Evelina married Joseph Dupuis on 31 October 1817. It was recorded that her mother, Sarah Danby, was a witness along with Charles Thompson.{{citation needed|date=July 2022}}

File:Linnell - J.M.W. Turner.jpg (1838)]]

Turner formed a relationship with Sophia Caroline Booth after her second husband died, and from 1846 he lived with her as "Mr Booth" or "Admiral Booth" in her house at 6 Davis's Place (now Cheyne Walk) in Chelsea, until his death in December 1851.{{cite web|url=http://www.turnersociety.org.uk/Turner_biography.pdf|title=Turner Biography & Chronology – The Turner Society|date=2 December 2022 }}{{cite web |title=Settlement and building: Artists and Chelsea Pages 102–106 A History of the County of Middlesex: Volume 12, Chelsea. |url=https://www.british-history.ac.uk/vch/middx/vol12/pp102-106 |website=British History Online |publisher=Victoria County History, 2004 |access-date=21 December 2022}}

Turner was a habitual user of snuff; in 1838, Louis Philippe I, King of the French, presented a gold snuff box to him.{{cite web |title=Collection Online: Snuff Box/box |url=https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database/search_object_details.aspx?objectid=74762&partid=1&output=People%2F!!%2FOR%2F!!%2F116764%2F!%2F116764-3-18%2F!%2FPrevious+owner%2Fex-collection+Louis+Philippe%2C+King+of+the+French%2F!%2F%2F!!%2F%2F!!!%2F&orig=%2Fresearch%2Fsearch_the_collection_database%2Fadvanced_search.aspx¤tPage=1&numpages=200 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130414113002/http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database/search_object_details.aspx?objectid=74762&partid=1&output=People/!!/OR/!!/116764/!/116764-3-18/!/Previous+owner/ex-collection+Louis+Philippe,+King+of+the+French/!//!!//!!!/&orig=/research/search_the_collection_database/advanced_search.aspx¤tPage=1&numpages=200 |publisher=British Museum| archive-date=14 April 2013 }} Of two other snuffboxes, an agate and silver example bears Turner's name,{{cite web| url=http://www.finch-and-co.co.uk/archive/antiquities/d/georgian-silver-and-agate-pocket-snuff-box-inscribed-%C3%A2%C2%80%C2%98joseph-mallord-william-tur/117264| title=Georgian Silver and Agate Pocket Snuff Box Inscribed 'Joseph Mallord William Turner' and the date '1785'| publisher=Finch & Co| access-date=3 September 2014| archive-date=29 September 2015| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150929161730/http://www.finch-and-co.co.uk/archive/antiquities/d/georgian-silver-and-agate-pocket-snuff-box-inscribed-%C3%A2%C2%80%C2%98joseph-mallord-william-tur/117264| url-status=dead}} and another, made of wood, was collected along with his spectacles, magnifying glass and card case by an associate housekeeper.{{cite web| url=http://www.philipmould.com/gallery/all-works/107| title=Spectacles, glass, snuffbox and cardcase of Turner 1775–1851| publisher=Philip Mould & Company| access-date=3 September 2014| archive-date=4 December 2014| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141204184229/http://www.philipmould.com/gallery/all-works/107| url-status=dead}}

Turner formed a short but intense friendship with the artist Edward Thomas Daniell. The painter David Roberts wrote of him that, "He adored Turner, when I and others doubted, and taught me to see & to distinguish his beauties over that of others ... the old man really had a fond & personal regard for this young clergyman, which I doubt he ever evinced for the other".{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|pp=319–320}} Daniell may have supplied Turner with the spiritual comfort he needed after the deaths of his father and friends, and to "ease the fears of a naturally reflective man approaching old age".{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|pp=319–320}} After Daniell's death in Lycia at the age of 38, he told Roberts he would never form such a friendship again.{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|p=356}}

Before leaving for the Middle East, Daniell commissioned Turner’s portrait from John Linnell. Turner had previously refused to sit for the artist, and it was difficult to get his agreement to be portrayed. Daniell positioned the two men opposite each other at dinner, so that Linnell could observe his subject carefully and portray his likeness from memory.{{sfn|Hamilton|2007|p=356}}File:Turners House, Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, 1887 by Philip Norman.jpg]]Turner died of cholera at the home of Sophia Caroline Booth, in Cheyne Walk in Chelsea, on 19 December 1851. He is buried in St Paul's Cathedral, where he lies near the painter Sir Joshua Reynolds. Apparently his last words were "The Sun (or Son?) is God",{{cite book| first=Norman| last=Davies| title=Europe: A History| location=London| publisher=Pimlico| url=https://archive.org/details/europehistory00norm/page/687| date=20 January 1998| page=[https://archive.org/details/europehistory00norm/page/687 687]| isbn=978-0-06-097468-8| access-date=3 September 2014}} {{subscription required|s}} though this may be apocryphal.{{Cite book|title=Turner in his Time|last=Wilton|first=Andrew|date=6 November 2006|publisher=Thames and Hudson Ltd|isbn=978-0-500-23830-1|edition=01|location=London|language=en}}

Turner's friend, the architect Philip Hardwick, the son of his old tutor, was in charge of making the funeral arrangements and wrote to those who knew Turner to tell them at the time of his death that, "I must inform you, we have lost him."{{citation needed|date=December 2017}} Other executors were his cousin and chief mourner at the funeral, Henry Harpur IV (benefactor of Westminster – now Chelsea & Westminster – Hospital), Revd. Henry Scott Trimmer, George Jones RA and Charles Turner ARA.{{cite book|last=Thornbury|first=Walter|title=The Life of J. M. W. Turner, R. A.: Founded on Letters and Papers Furnished by His Friends and Fellow Academicians|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DPE4AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA418|year=1862|publisher=Hurst and Blackett|page=418}}

Art

= Style =

Turner's talent was recognised early in his life. Financial independence allowed Turner to innovate freely; his mature work is characterized by a chromatic palette and broadly applied atmospheric washes of paint. According to David Piper's The Illustrated History of Art, his later pictures were called "fantastic puzzles". Turner was recognised as an artistic genius; the English art critic John Ruskin described him as the artist who could most "stirringly and truthfully measure the moods of Nature".{{cite book|title=The Illustrated History of Art|first=David |last=Piper|publisher=Bounty Books|date=2004|isbn= 978-0753709696|page=321}}

File:J.M.W. Turner's Rockets and Blue Lights (Close at Hand) to Warn Steamboats of Shoal Water.jpg, Williamstown, Massachusetts]]

Turner's imagination was sparked by shipwrecks, fires (including the burning of Parliament in 1834, an event which Turner witnessed first-hand, and transcribed in a series of watercolour sketches), and natural phenomena such as sunlight, storm, rain, and fog. He was fascinated by the violent power of the sea, as seen at the 1840 Royal Academy of Arts exhibition, where The Slave Ship (1840), and Rockets and Blue Lights (Close at Hand) to Warn Steamboats of Shoal Water (1840) were first shown. A 2003 exhibition at the Clark Art Institute suggested these two paintings were pendants, due in part to their similar content and size.{{Cite book |last=Hamilton |first=James |title=Turner: the late seascapes [exhibition, Sterling and Francine Clark art institute, Williamstown, Mass., 14 June - 7 September 2003, Manchester art gallery, Manchester, England, 31 October 2003 - 25 January 2004, Burrell collection, Glasgow, Scotland, 19 February - 23 May 2004] |date=2003 |publisher=Yale university press Sterling and Francine Clark art institute |isbn=978-0-300-09900-3 |location=New Haven London Williamstown (Mass.)}}

Turner's work drew criticism from contemporaries. An anonymous review of the 1840 Royal Academy exhibition, later identified as John Eagles, called the displayed paintings “absurd extravagances [that] disgrace the Exhibition”.{{Cite book |last=Hamilton |first=James |title=Turner: the late seascapes [exhibition, Sterling and Francine Clark art institute, Williamstown, Mass., 14 June - 7 September 2003, Manchester art gallery, Manchester, England, 31 October 2003 - 25 January 2004, Burrell collection, Glasgow, Scotland, 19 February - 23 May 2004] |date=2003 |publisher=Yale university press Sterling and Francine Clark art institute |isbn=978-0-300-09900-3 |location=New Haven London Williamstown (Mass.)}} Sir George Beaumont, a landscape painter and fellow member of the Royal Academy, described his paintings as "blots".{{cite book |last=Wilkinson |first=Gerald |title=The Sketches of Turner, R.A. |date=1974 |publisher=Barrie & Jenkins |location=London}}

Turner's major venture into printmaking was the Liber Studiorum (Book of Studies), seventy prints that he worked on from 1806 to 1819. The Liber Studiorum was an expression of his intentions for landscape art. The idea was loosely based on Claude Lorrain's Liber Veritatis (Book of Truth), where Claude had recorded his completed paintings; a series of print copies of these drawings, by then at Devonshire House, had been a huge publishing success. Turner's plates were meant to be widely disseminated, and categorised the genre into six types: Marine, Mountainous, Pastoral, Historical, Architectural, and Elevated or Epic Pastoral. His printmaking was a major part of his output, and a museum is devoted to it, the Turner Museum in Sarasota, Florida, founded in 1974 by Douglass Montrose-Graem to house his collection of Turner prints.{{cite web |url=http://www.turnermuseum.org |title=The Turner Museum |publisher=The Turner Museum and Thomas Moran Galleries |access-date=30 August 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100216031921/http://www.turnermuseum.org/ |archive-date=16 February 2010 |url-status=usurped }}

His early works, such as Tintern Abbey (1795), stay true to the traditions of English landscape. In Hannibal Crossing the Alps (1812), an emphasis on the destructive power of nature has already come into play. His distinctive style of painting, in which he used watercolour technique with oil paints, created lightness, fluency, and ephemeral atmospheric effects.

In Turner's later years, he used oils ever more transparently and turned to an evocation of almost pure light by use of shimmering colour. A prime example of his mature style can be seen in Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway, where the objects are barely recognisable. The intensity of hue and interest in evanescent light not only placed Turner's work in the vanguard of English painting but exerted an influence on art in France; the Impressionists, particularly Claude Monet, carefully studied his techniques. He is also generally regarded as a precursor of abstract painting.

High levels of volcanic ash (from the eruption of Mount Tambora) in the atmosphere during 1816, the "Year Without a Summer", led to unusually spectacular sunsets during this period, and were an inspiration for some of Turner's work.

John Ruskin said that an early patron, Thomas Monro, Principal Physician of Bedlam, and a collector and amateur artist, was a significant influence on Turner's style:

His true master was Dr Monro; to the practical teaching of that first patron and the wise simplicity of method of watercolour study, in which he was disciplined by him and companioned by his friend Girtin, the healthy and constant development of the greater power is primarily to be attributed; the greatness of the power itself, it is impossible to over-estimate.

Together with a number of young artists, Turner was able, in Monro's London house, to copy works of the major topographical draughtsmen of his time and perfect his skills in drawing. But the curious atmospherical effects and illusions of John Robert Cozens's watercolours, some of which were present in Monro's house, went far further than the neat renderings of topography. The solemn grandeur of his Alpine views were an early revelation to the young Turner and showed him the true potential of the watercolour medium, conveying mood instead of information.

= Materials =

Turner experimented with a wide variety of pigments.{{Cite journal|last=Townsend|first=Joyce H.|date=1993|title=The Materials of J. M. W. Turner: Pigments|jstor=1506368|journal=Studies in Conservation|volume=38|issue=4|pages=231–254|doi=10.2307/1506368}} He used formulations like carmine, despite knowing that they were not long-lasting, and against the advice of contemporary experts to use more durable pigments. As a result, many of his colours have now faded. Ruskin complained at how quickly his work decayed; Turner was indifferent to posterity and chose materials that looked good when freshly applied.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=w486V_or5P8C&q=turner+|title=Color: A Natural History of the Palette|last=Finlay|first=Victoria|publisher=Random House Trade Paperbacks|year=2004|isbn=0-8129-7142-6|pages=134–135}} {{subscription required|s}} By 1930, there was concern that both his oils and his watercolours were fading.{{cite news|url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article83121606|title=Colors That Fade: Turner's Masterpieces: Can his works be saved?|date=9 January 1930|work=The Daily News|page=2|access-date=18 May 2014}}

=Gallery=

{{gallery

|height=150

|mode=packed

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - Fisherman's Cottage, Dover - Google Art Project.jpg|Fisherman's Cottage, Dover, 1790 Yale Center for British Art

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - Clare Hall and King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, from the Banks of the River Cam - Google Art Project.jpg|Clare Hall and King's College Chapel, Cambridge, from the Banks of the River Cam, 1793, watercolour{{efn|Referring to the present-day Clare College, formerly named Clare Hall, and not the present-day Clare Hall|}}, Yale Center for British Art|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - The Angler - Google Art Project.jpg|The Angler, 1794, Yale Center for British Art

|File:(Barcelona) Morning amongst the Coniston Fells, Cumberland - William Turner - Tate Britain.jpg|Morning Amongst the Coniston Fells, 1798, Tate Britain

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - Dutch Boats in a Gale - WGA23163.jpg|Dutch Boats in a Gale, 1801, oil on canvas

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner 024.jpg|Calais Pier, 1803, oil on canvas, National Gallery, London

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - London from Greenwich Park - Google Art Project.jpg|London from Greenwich Park, 1809, oil on canvas, Tate Britain

|File:Saltash with the Water Ferry, Cornwall MET DP169566.jpg|Saltash with the Water Ferry, 1811, oil on canvas, Metropolitan Museum of Art

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner 081.jpg|Snow Storm: Hannibal and his Army Crossing the Alps, 1812, oil on canvas, Tate Britain

|File:DortorDordrecht.jpg|Dort or Dordrecht: The Dort packet-boat from Rotterdam becalmed, 1818, oil on canvas, Yale Center for British Art

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) - The Field of Waterloo - NG500 - Tate.jpg|The Field of Waterloo, 1818, Tate Britain

|File:Turner Cologne, the Arrival of a Packet-Boat, Evening.jpg|Cologne, the Arrival of a Packet Boat in the Evening, 1826, Frick Collection

|File:Venice - The Dogana and San Giorgio Maggiore by Joseph Mallord William Turner, 1834, oil on canvas, view 2 - National Gallery of Art, Washington - DSC00005.JPG|Venice: The Dogana and San Giorgio Maggiore, {{circa}} 1834, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, 16 October 1834 - 1942.647 - Cleveland Museum of Art.jpg |The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, 16 October 1834, oil on canvas, Cleveland Museum of Art

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner, English - The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, October 16, 1834 - Google Art Project.jpg|The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, 16th October, 1834, {{circa}} 1835, oil on canvas, Philadelphia Museum of Art

|File:Wreckers Coast of Northumberland Joseph Mallord William Turner.jpeg|Wreckers Coast of Northumberland, {{circa}} 1836, oil on canvas, Yale Center for British Art

|File:Chicago art inst turner vallee aoste.JPG|Valley of Aosta: Snowstorm, Avalanche and Thunderstorm, 1836–37, oil on canvas, Art Institute of Chicago

|File:The Fighting Temeraire, JMW Turner, National Gallery.jpg|The Fighting Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up, 1838, oil on canvas, National Gallery, London

|File:Slave-ship.jpg|The Slave Ship, 1840, oil on canvas, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - Snow Storm - Steam-Boat off a Harbour's Mouth - WGA23178.jpg|Snow Storm: Steam-Boat off a Harbour's Mouth, {{circa}} 1842, oil on canvas, Tate Britain

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Evening of the Deluge, c. 1843, NGA 46064.jpg|The Evening of the Deluge, {{circa}} 1843, National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.

|File:Turner - Rain, Steam and Speed - National Gallery file.jpg|Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway, 1844, oil on canvas, National Gallery, London

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner - Norham Castle, Sunrise - WGA23182.jpg|Norham Castle, Sunrise, {{circa}} 1845, oil on canvas, Tate Britain

|File:Turner - The Wreck Buoy, c.1849, WAG 310.jpg|The Wreck Buoy', {{circa}} 1849, Sudley House

|File:Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) - The Departure of the Fleet - N00554 - National Gallery.jpg|The Departure of the Fleet, 1850, National Gallery, London

}}

Legacy

Turner left a small fortune, which he hoped would be used to support what he called "decayed artists". He planned an almshouse at Twickenham in west London with a gallery for some of his works. His will was contested and in 1856, after a court battle, his first cousins, including Thomas Price Turner, received part of his fortune.{{cite book| title=The Great Artists: J.M.W. Turner R.A.| first=William Cosmo| last=Monkhouse| year=1879| page=121| publisher=Scribner and Welford| location=New York| url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/40878/40878-h/40878-h.htm#page_121| access-date=3 September 2014}} Another portion went to the Royal Academy of Arts, which occasionally awards students the Turner Medal. His finished paintings were bequeathed to the British nation, and he intended that a special gallery would be built to house them. This did not happen because there was disagreement over the final site. Twenty-two years after his death, the British Parliament passed an act allowing his paintings to be lent to museums outside London, and so began the process of scattering the pictures which Turner had wanted to be kept together.

One of the greatest collectors of his work was Henry Vaughan, who when he died in 1899 owned more than one hundred watercolours and drawings by Turner and as many prints. His collection included examples of almost every type of work on paper the artist produced, from early topographical drawings and atmospheric landscape watercolours, to brilliant colour studies, literary vignette illustrations and spectacular exhibition pieces. It included nearly a hundred proofs of Liber Studiorum and twenty-three drawings connected with it. It was an unparalleled collection that comprehensively represented the diversity, imagination and technical inventiveness of Turner's work throughout his sixty-year career. Vaughan bequeathed the most of his Turner collection to British and Irish public galleries and museums, stipulating that the collections of Turner's watercolours should be 'exhibited to the public all at one time, free of charge and only in January', demonstrating an awareness of conservation which was unusual at the time.[https://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-28131 Herrmann, L. (23 September 2004). Vaughan, Henry (1809–1899), art collector. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.]

In 1910, the main part of the Turner Bequest, which includes unfinished paintings and drawings, was rehoused in the Duveen Turner Wing at the National Gallery of British Art (now Tate Britain). In 1987, a new wing at the Tate, the Clore Gallery, was opened to house the Turner bequest, though some of the most important paintings remain in the National Gallery in contravention of Turner's condition that they be kept and shown together. Increasingly paintings are lent abroad, ignoring Turner's provision that they remain constantly and permanently in Turner's Gallery.

St. Mary's Church, Battersea, added a commemorative stained glass window for Turner, between 1976 and 1982.{{cite web| url=http://home.clara.net/pkennington/VirtualTour/windows_modern.htm#Turner| title=St. Mary's Church Parish website| quote=St Mary's Modern Stained Glass}} St Paul's Cathedral, Royal Academy of Arts and the Victoria & Albert Museum all hold statues representing him. A portrait by Cornelius Varley with his patent graphic telescope (Sheffield Museums & Galleries) was compared with his death mask (National Portrait Gallery, London) by Kelly Freeman at Dundee University 2009–10 to ascertain whether it really depicts Turner. The City of Westminster unveiled a memorial plaque at the site of his birthplace at 21 Maiden Lane, Covent Garden, on 2 June 1999.{{cite web| publisher=City of Westminster| url=http://transact.westminster.gov.uk/greenplaques/displaybyname.cfm| title=Joseph Mallord William Turner| access-date=3 September 2014| url-status=dead| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131203015135/http://transact.westminster.gov.uk/greenplaques/displaybyname.cfm| archive-date=3 December 2013}}

Selby Whittingham founded The Turner Society at London and Manchester in 1975. After the society endorsed the Tate Gallery's Clore Gallery wing (on the lines of the Duveen wing of 1910), as the solution to the controversy of what should be done with the Turner Bequest, Selby Whittingham resigned and founded the Independent Turner Society. The Tate created the prestigious annual Turner Prize art award in 1984, named in Turner's honour, and 20 years later the Royal Institute of Painters in Water Colours founded the Winsor & Newton Turner Watercolour Award. A major exhibition, "Turner's Britain", with material (including The Fighting Temeraire) on loan from around the globe, was held at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery from 7 November 2003 to 8 February 2004. In 2005, Turner's The Fighting Temeraire was voted Britain's "greatest painting" in a public poll organised by the BBC.{{cite news| title=Turner wins 'great painting' vote| url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4214824.stm| date=5 September 2005| work=BBC News| access-date=3 September 2014}}

Portrayal

Leo McKern played Turner in The Sun Is God, a 1974 Thames Television production directed by Michael Darlow.{{Cite web| title = The Sun Is God (1974)| work = British Film Institute| access-date = 31 March 2015| url = http://explore.bfi.org.uk/4ce2b774caca5| archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20141121194616/http://explore.bfi.org.uk/4ce2b774caca5| url-status = dead| archive-date = 21 November 2014}} The programme aired on 17 December 1974, during the Turner Bicentenary Exhibition in London.{{Cite book| publisher = UNSW Press| isbn = 978-1-921410-89-5| last = Whaley| first = George| title = Leo 'Rumpole' McKern: The Accidental Actor| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=relt16ELhI4C&q=the+sun+is+god+leo+mckern&pg=PA181| page=181| access-date=31 March 2015| date = 2009}}

British filmmaker Mike Leigh wrote and directed Mr. Turner, a biopic of Turner's later years, released in 2014. The film stars Timothy Spall as Turner, Dorothy Atkinson, Marion Bailey and Paul Jesson, and premiered in competition for the {{Lang|fr|Palme d'Or}} at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival, with Spall taking the award for Best Actor.{{cite news| title=Timothy Spall to play JMW Turner in Mike Leigh biopic| url=https://www.theguardian.com/film/2012/oct/23/timothy-spall-jmw-turner-mike-leigh| last=Child| first=Ben| work=The Guardian| date=23 October 2012| access-date=3 September 2014}}{{cite web| title=Mr. Turner| url=http://www.film4.com/reviews/2014/mr-turner| publisher=Film 4| access-date=3 September 2014}}

The Bank of England announced that a portrait of Turner, with a backdrop of The Fighting Temeraire, would appear on the £20 note beginning in 2020. It is the first £20 British banknote printed on polymer.{{cite web |title=Polymer £20 note |url=https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/polymer-20-pound-note |website=Bank of England}} The Turner £20 note entered circulation on Thursday, 20 February 2020.{{Cite web |date=2024-09-19 |title=Turner £20 enters circulation |url=https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/2020/february/turner-20-enters-circulation |access-date=2024-10-09 |website=www.bankofengland.co.uk |language=en}}

Explanatory notes

Citations

General and cited sources

{{cite book |last=Bailey |first=Anthony |author-link=Anthony Bailey (author)|title=Standing in the Sun: A Life of J. M. W. Turner |year=1998 |publisher=Pimlico |location=London |isbn=0-7126-6604-4}}
{{cite book |last=Finberg |first=A. J. |title=The Life of J. M. W. Turner, R.A. |location=Oxford |publisher=Oxford University Press |orig-year=1939 |year=1961}}
{{cite book |last=Hamilton |first=James |title=Turner |year=2007 |publisher=Random House |location=New York |isbn=978-0-8129-6791-3}}
{{cite book |last=Harrison |first=Colin |title=Turner's Oxford |publisher=Ashmolean Museum |location=Oxford |year=2000}}
{{cite book |last=Hill |first=David |title=Turner and Leeds: Image of Industry |publisher=Jeremy Mills Publishing |year=2008}}
{{cite book |last=Moyle |first=Franny |author-link=Franny Moyle|title=Turner: The Extraordinary Life and Momentous Times of J.M.W. Turner |publisher=Penguin/Random House |year=2016 |isbn=978-0-241-96456-9}}
{{cite book |last=Warburton |first=Stanley |title=Discovering Turner's Lakeland |location=Lytham St Annes|publisher= Stanley Warburton |year=2008}}
{{cite book |last=Whittingham |first=Selby |author-link=Selby Whittingham |title=An Historical Account of the Will of J. M. W. Turner, R.A. |publisher=J. M. W. Turner, R.A., Publications |location=London |date=1993–1996}}
{{cite book |last=Wilton |first=Andrew |title=Turner in His Time |year=2006 |publisher=Thames & Hudson |location=London |isbn=978-0-500-23830-1 |edition=revised}}

External links

{{Wikisource|Popular Science Monthly/Volume 1/June 1872/Effects of Faulty Vision in Painting|Effects of Faulty Vision in Painting}}

{{Cite Americana|short=1|wstitle=Turner, Joseph Mallord William|year=1920}}
{{Art UK bio}}
[https://www.turnersociety.com/ The Turner Society]
[https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/building/palace/estatehistory/reformation-1834/destruction-by-fire/ Turner & the 1834 Parliament Fire – UK Parliament Living Heritage]
[http://libmma.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/search/field/contri/searchterm/Turner,%20J.%20M.%20W.%20(Joseph%20Mallord%20William),%201775-1851/mode/exact J.M.W. Turner exhibition catalogs]
[http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/BrowseGroup?cgroupid=999999998 Web site of the Tate Turner Collection, includes the "Turner Bequest" of over 300 Oil paintings and over 30,000 sketches. The catalogue holds records of over 40,000 works by Turner]
{{Gutenberg author | id=24796}}
{{Internet Archive author |sname=Joseph Mallord William Turner}}
[https://www.tate.org.uk/art/brief-history-abstract-art-turner-mondrian-and-more A Brief History of Abstract Art with Turner, Mondrian and More]
[https://www.metmuseum.org/art/metpublications/Turners_Whaling_Pictures "Turner's Whaling Pictures"], The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, v. 73, no. 4 (Spring, 2016)
{{Cite news |last=Johnson |first=Ken |date=2016-06-03 |title=In Turner Paintings at the Met, the Bloody Business of Whaling |pages=C23 |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/03/arts/design/in-turner-paintings-at-the-met-the-bloody-business-of-whaling.html |url-access=limited |id={{ProQuest|2310050465}}}}
{{ws|Rocks at Colgong on the Ganges}}, engraved by Edward Goodall for Fisher's Drawing Room Scrap Book, 1839, with a poetical illustration by Letitia Elizabeth Landon.
[https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2008/08/14/splendid-lies/ "Splendid Lies"] review by John Updike of J.M.W. Turner: an exhibition at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., October 1, 2007 – January 6, 2008; the Dallas Museum of Art, February 10 – May 18, 2008; and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, June 24 – September 21, 2008.
[https://www.hs-augsburg.de/~harsch/anglica/Chronology/19thC/Turner/tur_po00.html Turner's poems and other texts] (Bibliotheca Augustana)
[https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2025/apr/19/jmw-turner-250-tate-britain-contemporary-margate?mc_cid=ce457be30d&mc_eid=6561fcf1e9 "Turner 250, a year-long festival of events, is running now at the Tate Britain, London; Turner Contemporary, Margate, and galleries around the UK"] Jones, Jonathan. "Why JMW Turner is still Britain’s best artist, 250 years on". The Guardian, 19 April 2025.
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