AFA Winter 2019

Antiques & Fine Art 67 2019 J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851) A Mountainous Coast with a Stranded Vessel, or Whale, Possibly at Penmaenmawr or in North- East England, ca. 1825–1838 Graphite and watercolor on paper, 371 x 551 mm Tate: Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856 © Tate, 2019. This work encapsulates the astonishing value of the Turner Bequest as an archive into Turner’s practice. The raw elements of the storm barrel out of the page, engulfing the viewer. You can see Turner working through different techniques to bring this scene to life. At the same time, it is an exercise in private experimentation, never intended to be seen as a finished work. It’s a perfect example of why Turner’s art has appealed to mariners since he first tackled seascapes in his precocious youth. J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851) Coastal Terrain, ca. 1830–1845 Watercolor on paper, 221 x 271 mm Tate: Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856 © Tate, 2019. This is a prime example of what are called Turner’s “color beginnings”— loose sketches meant to capture the palette of a particular lived moment. It’s very tempting to feed these beginnings into a narrative establishing Turner as a father of abstraction in Western art. However, Turner would never have considered abstraction a goal of his work. If anything, such rapid sketches reveal his consummate ability to translate any scene into pure color as a step toward more compelling representational work.