TURNER, TURNED ME AROUND.


Have you seen Mike Leigh’s film « Mr Turner »? I was invited to the special viewing at the Louvre and Mike Leigh was there to talk about it. As I was about to visit London to see Pierrette and the Turner, I thought the film would give me some insight into his work. 
Frankly it was the man I got to « know ». A grumpy, grouchy person with a strong cockney accent. A man of the street who throughout his life invented « other names » so he could stay incognito.
The film is fascinating and I would certainly recommend it, but I didn’t come out liking the man. (Turner: Baptized in May 1775-1851)

The exhibition,(Late Turner, "Painting set Free") at the Tate was on the last 15 years of his life. Created between 1835 and his death in 1851.His work has always stirred passions, especially in the later years when many of this paintings were met with derision by the conservative critics of the time. Even to the extent of being described as « slapdash, evidence of a diseased eye and reckless hand » John Ruskin who was a leading critic of Victorian art and in admiration of Turner thought that his latter work was « indicative of mental illness ».

Much later the song changed and he was seen as a visionary precursor to impressions and abstraction. Perhaps the first modern artist? The forefather of Monet and even Marc Rothko? In 1970 Rothko made major gifts to the Tate in Turner’s honor - the great « Seagram Murals » which we saw at the retrospective of his work in the Hague.

My former impressions of Turner were not that positive. Frankly there were only a few of the oils which I really appreciated. This time though, I went overboard with the water colors. They were fantastic and so sensual for a man who appeared to be rather a brute in the film. Sensuality, gentleness and even the sea scenes with ships burning or the burial at sea were very touching.


Peace - Burial at Sea exhibited 1842

 A Storm over the Rigi
c.1844 A

 Joseph Mallord William Turner The Blue Rigi 1844

Goldau, with the Lake of Zug in the Distance: Sample Study circa 1842-3

Fishermen on the Lagoon, Moonlight 1840

The Burning of the Houses of Parliament ?1834-5

 Joseph Mallord William Turner The Blue Rigi 1844

 Seascape with Storm Coming On c.1840

Norham Castle, Sunrise circa 1845

Returning from the Ball (St Martha) exhibited 1846












No-one knows if Turner really did have himself strapped to the top of the mast of a sailing ship so he could experience the storm (it certainly looked very treacherous in the film) but the painting depicts the sea in an uproar……


Snow Storm - Steam-Boat off a Harbour's Mouth exhibited 1842


The bequest to the Tate was rich indeed. How many paintings, documents, sketches, paper cuttings is amounted to is not so clear. Although Turner was offered a fortune by some millionaire to buy all his work, he left it to the State but there was a very clear statement in the will. The work could not be separated and had to be shown in one spot. This is perhaps why there are few such exhibitions (150 paintings in this one) outside of the Tate. The one we had in the Louvre a couple of years ago only showed a couple of his works - which did little for me
.
The water colors bowled me over. In actual fact, as I said to Pierrette, I would have been even happier if they had been without « people » or definable objects. Yes, Turner turned me around and I will be looking out for his water colors elsewhere.


http://bcove.me/7cx5a3ke - this is a video presenting the exhibition. It’s not long and worth it if you can see it....

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