Heroic Turner
Nimblewill Makalani Dearden
Seabury Hall
Makawao, HI
NEH Seminar 2006
Perhaps one of the most fascinating and titillating stories about Turner comes
from the end of his life. In this period, he reinvented himself. Turner began to live in
Chelsea with Mrs. Booth and took on an assumed name, Admiral Booth.1 It seems quite
fitting that when he forged a new identity for himself, it was as a heroic naval officer.
Perhaps lost in his alcoholism and nearing his own death he slipped into that dream world
he has crafted and pursued in his paintings.
From even his earliest days, aspects of the Industrial Revolution made numerous
appearances in Turner’s life. In 1793, Turner sat for his drawing examinations at the
house of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, which was “a centre of discussion
and display of technological improvements,” and so he would have found himself at a
nexus of practical technology and theoretical science. 2 Turner maintained a friendship
with the chemist Michael Faraday, and the science writer Mary Somerville, and was a
founding member of the Athenaeum Club, an organization that “brought together
scientists, writers and artists.”3 Turner was also concerned enough about the
environmental impact of industrialization to serve on a committee that investigated how
the Thames might be purified.4 Turner loved gadgets. His worktable in his studio was
“an oversize lazy Susan” that brought all his materials within easy reach and he carried
1
Tate Britain, “Turner Online,” internet, 27 August 2006, available: http://www.tate.org.uk/
Britain/turner/
2
James Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists (Millbank, London: Tate Gallery Publishing, 1998)
37.
3
Norman Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic: A Fascination with the Machine
Age Powered the Brush of the Artist J.M.W. Turner,” The Sciences (November/December 1998): 40 and
41.
4
Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic,” 40.
2
an umbrella with a dagger concealed in the handle.5 Turner also sketched commercial,
mechanical, and industrial scenes. For example, he recorded “a harbour landing stage,
with dockside paraphernalia such as windlasses, flagpoles and so on” in 1793;
demonstrating an interest in machines and their applications.6
And he confirmed that
interest when he recorded the use of the new Manby apparatus in Life Boat and Manby
Apparatus Going Off to a Stranded Vessel Making Signal (Blue Lights) of Distress in
1831.7 He painted blacksmith’s forges and iron foundries, capstans, steamboats,
locomotives, bridge building, mill towns, and textile mills.8 Turner was prolific and for
more than sixty years he painted a vast array of subjects, but scholars like Norman
Weinstein have argued that it was his “innovative portrayal of new technologies” that
“set him aside from the other artists of his generation.”9
Turner was preeminently concerned with heroism, and his most fascinating
Industrial Revolution images are largely concerned with the effects of technology and
other social changes on heroism. Living and working during the social and cultural
upheavals of the early nineteenth century would have raised an interesting question: Is
heroism a static notion, or can it change when the society undergoes significant changes?
Perhaps the industrial revolution was a revolution in heroism to Turner. He saw, and
depicted his traditional, beloved icons overshadowed by modern ones. But he began to
believe modern technology could be man’s ally in his heroic struggles with the forces of
the natural world. At the same time, Turner strove to elevate landscape painting to the
level of respectability that historical painting enjoyed. In the end, Turner seemed to
conclude that heroism is eternal and transcends cultural shifts.
5
Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic,” 40.
6
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 37.
Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic,” 40. Weinstein describes the Manby apparatus as a
“simple mechanism” in which “an illuminated cannonball was attached to a rope and shot from shore into
the rigging of a ship in distress, thereby providing a line the sailors could use to escape.”
7
8
Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic,” 40 and 41. This very general comment was the only
tantalizing reference I found to a textile mill image in Turner’s work.
9
Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic,” 40.
3
Passing of Traditional Heroic Emblems
Turner was deeply affectionate toward old technology and the legacy of old oak
ships. He relished the heroism and tragic losses on both battle ships and civilian vessels.
Thus it is not surprising that some of his paintings expressed ambivalence about the
passing of old heroic forms and the appearance of new ones. Steamships are often
praised because they made “marine travel safer, quicker and possible to timetable
reliably.”10 But in his art, Turner was less concerned with predictability and practicality
of timetables and more concerned with how ships performed in a moment of crisis, the
times when heroic efforts might be required.
Hamilton interprets the Temeraire as “The classic image of the painful but
inevitable change in early-nineteenth century shipping from sail to steam.”11 Turner
mourns the passing of the heroic veteran and is critical of the disrespect with which it was
treated. But at the same time, Turner depicts the sailing battleship as past its zenith,
supplanted by the new steamship, which is more efficient, more effective. He gives both
ships equal prominence in the image and “casts them both in heroic roles.”12
In a watercolor, Between Quilleboef and Villequier, Turner again places a
steamship and a sailing ship together. In this case, the steamer is being used “to tug
sailing ships out of difficulty.”13 The steamer is a dark, belching, almost ominous figure
at the center of the image. Perhaps it is cast as the hero in a rescue, but on the flat, glassy
waters it seem more that it has resolved that struggle between man and even a tranquil
nature; thus pre-empting even the most timid heroism.
Dover always had “strong symbolic associations as Britain’s premier gateway and
bastion.”14 Among the numerous costal ports of the Picturesque Views of England and
Wales series, it is only in his image of Dover that a steamship appears. Another
watercolor from the same series, entitled Dover Castle, shows a steamer “converted from
10
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 78.
11
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 74.
12
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 74.
13
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 79.
14
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 78.
4
a sailing boat” and heavily loaded with passengers.15 It “bustles past a stranded brig,
while two small sailing boats find themselves in some kind of difficulty in the choppy
sea.”16 This was an image of a precarious moment on the sea. Hamilton has argued that
to “most men and women with experience of the sea” could have read it “with ease.”17
Hamilton argues that the meaning of the image is that the steamer is as able to withstand
“angry seas” as the thousand year old Dover Castle, which rises above it.18 According to
this interpretation, the watercolor suggests an immortality, or even timelessness of the
steamship. The image is ambivalent, the steamer might be heroic in its steadfastness and
its triumph, or it might be slicing through a heroic opportunity, unawares and nonplussed.
In this watercolor, the steamer “steams cheerily out to sea, while all around it sailing
ships do the wind’s will, and oarsmen puff and pant.”19 Perhaps Turner, for a time,
thought the survival of marine and naval heroism was uncertain when, as Hamilton
extolled, steamships could negotiate many difficulties “with relative ease”20
In 1840, Turner displayed two paintings in the Royal Academy exhibition.
Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying – Typhoon Coming On and Rockets
and Blue Lights (Close at Hand) to Warn Steam-Boats of Shoal-Water are painted in
“opposing color values, the former principally red and yellow, the latter blue and
yellow.”21 “This was a manner of color handling that Turner practiced in acknowledged
pendants during the late 1830s and 1840s.”22 Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and
Dying is a condemnation of slavery, but Turner was not making a radical or controversial
political statement in this painting. In fact, slavery was already banned in Britain, and
15
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 78.
16
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 78.
17
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 78.
18
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 78.
19
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 78.
20
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 79.
21
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 91.
22
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 91.
5
soon would be outlawed in other European nations.23 Rather than trying to provoke fresh
outrage in his audience, Turner may be invoking their pre-existing disapproval and
disgust toward slavery and using it to make another point. Rockets and Blue Lights
depicts a happy juxtaposition between two symbols of the modern; the steamship and the
“new rocket technology.”24 The image shows the “increasingly common” practice of
“concerned and organized onlookers” warning steamship crews “to keep well away from
the shallows” using rockets, thus saving “themselves and their cargoes.”25 Hamilton feels
that the paring of the two paintings suggests a contrast between a “criminal and inhuman
act . . . of barbarism at sea,” and “the new maritime safety measure successfully
deployed.”26 By the time Turner creates these images, he seems to more at peace with
the role of the steamship; he is ready to cast it as the beloved hero, and the sailing ship as
the despised, cowardly villain.
Turner visited the city of Dudley, in England’s Black Country, in 1830. Dudley
was a hub for the industrial revolution; it was a manufacturing center, the steam engine
was first operated nearby, and the first iron steamship was built at the Horseley
Ironworks in 1821.27 Turner’s watercolor Dudley provides another example of a
comparison between traditional emblems and modern ones, this time using architectural
elements. The steeple and castle in the high distance are echoed in the low foreground by
several vertical smoke stacks. In fact, Turner has located the highest of the smoke stacks
almost directly below the church spire. The steeple and castle, “symbols of tradition and
faith,” are indistinct, obscured by a haze.28 The symbols of industrialization and
modernity are more immediate, more tangible in comparison. As a consequence, Turner
evokes a change from “an England dominated by the Church to one driven by
23
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 91.
24
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 91.
25
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 91.
26
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 91.
27
National Museums Liverpool, “Walker Art Gallery,” internet, 02 September 2006,
available:http://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/walker/collections/graphics
28
National Museums Liverpool, “Walker Art Gallery.”
6
industry.”29 While most scholars agree that the painting depicts the “dramatic intensity of
a town in the throes of industrial change,” they have been very much divided on Turner
reaction to that change. John Ruskin, a friend and avid supporter of Turner’s, owned the
painting for a time and he believed it showed Turner’s hatred of industrialization. But it
has been suggested that Ruskin’s perspective was “distorted by his own increasing
antipathy toward industrialization and probably had little to do with Turner’s real
intentions.”30 Hamilton’s modern eye read the painting in a similar way, he suggests that
it is “Turner’s evocation of the beautiful hellishness of industrial development in Britain”
and calls it a “lurid industrial scene.”31 But it is also possible that Turner saw the scene
not as hellish or lurid, but saw the glowing, general illumination as representing “the
hidden, mysterious powers of mechanization.”32 After this the verticals in his landscapes
switch to chimneys of industry.
The juxtaposition between the old and the new in Rain, Steam, and Speed – The
Great Western Railway (exh. 1844) is twofold.33 First, there are the two bridges; in the
right foreground is Brunel’s Maidenhead Bridge, and in the left background is the multiarched road bridge built by Sir Robert Taylor in the late eighteenth century. Hamilton
calls Brunel’s London to Bristol line “a heroic achievement,” because he was forced to
overcome several engineering difficulties, including the obstacles placed in his path by
the Thames Commissioners.34 The Commissioners insisted that the towpath remain
unobstructed and the width of the navigation channel beside it be maintained. They also
stipulated only one central pier was to be employed, and it could be erected on only one
location, the island in the river. This Commissioners’ demands and the existing elevation
29
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 98.
30
National Museums Liverpool, “Walker Art Gallery.”
31
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 97.
32
National Museums Liverpool, “Walker Art Gallery.”
33
According to Gage, Cosmo Monkhouse suggested that a third dichotomy exists in the painting
between old and new, between the train and the ploughman. But I find that position unconvincing and
omitted it from this discussion. John Gage, Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed (London: Penguin Press, 1972),
33.
34
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 102.
7
of the line catapulted Brunel toward innovation. He built a pair of innovative 130-foot
elliptical arches, “the largest and flattest that had ever been built in brickwork.”35 A
Victorian guidebook praised the “courage and capacity which have approached so near
the verge of possibility without transgressing it.”36 But Brunel’s design also met with
strong opposition and his critics “howled that the bridge would collapse,” especially in
periods of foul weather.37 Hamilton argues that “in choosing to depict a steam engine
passing both along Brunel’s line and over his Maidenhead Bridge and in a violent storm,
Turner is allying himself directly with the engineer, and publicly applauding his
triumph.”38 The old bridge in a hazy background is supplanted by the new industrial age
bridge in the foreground.
Second, there is the pair of the locomotive and the hare. The traditional emblem
of speed, the hare, is contrasted with the new-fangled emblem for the same abstraction,
the railroad engine. John Gage traced a similar use of a hare in Battle Abbey, the spot
where Harold fell and Apollo and Daphne and he postulates that Rain, Steam, and Speed
is “an allegory of the forces of nature using up-to-date imagery.”39 Many authors,
including Gage, have pointed out that the locomotives of the period were not fast enough
to overtake a hare.40 The locomotives of the period were actually capable of traveling at
“the then-unheard of speed of thirty-three miles an hour.”41 But despite the facts,
Turner’s critics make numerous references to a train speed of fifty miles per hour when
writing about Rain Steam and Speed. Perhaps Turner and his contemporaries were
influenced by Brunel’s marketing, for example Brunel predicted that his wide gage trains
35
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 103. The precise size of the arches was provided in Gage,
Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed, 24.
36
As quoted in Gage, Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed, 24.
37
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 103.
38
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 103.
39
Gage, Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed. As referenced in Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The
Paintings of J.M.W. Turner (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977), 233.
40
Gage, Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed, 33.
41
Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic,” 42.
8
would reach speeds of a hundred miles an hour.42 Hamilton makes the compelling
suggestions that the image is intended to pass in a blur, “defying the elements and leaving
us with what is in effect a retinal after-image of the train rushing by.”43 This perspective
would support the interpretation that the train is a sincere depiction of speed, rather than a
facetious one.
Although the juxtaposition of traditional and modern images is not as explicit in
Peace- Burial at Sea and The Hero of a Hundred Fights these variations on the theme
reveal additional complexities. Both of these images mark the passing of a man that
Turner respected; Sir David Wilkie, a friend and rival, and Arthur Wellesley, a national
hero. Turner chose an industrial setting for both paintings; a steamship and a foundry,
and transformed them into axis mundi, places where the worlds of the dead and the living
intersect.
Wilkie died while returning from the Middle East on a steamer named the
Oriental and was given a sea burial off the coast of Gibraltar.44 Peace- Burial at Sea
(exh. 1842) is a rendering of that event. Turner depicts the Oriental and her sails with so
much somber black paint that a supplement for The Times described it as “an object
resembling a burnt and blackened fish-kettle.”45 Turner responded to the criticisms by
saying, “I only wish I had any color to make them blacker.”46
The Hero of a Hundred Fights (exh. 1847) is an image of the casting of the
equestrian statue of the Duke of Wellington by Matthew Cotes Wyatt in 1846, and was
Turner’ final and “most dramatic evocation of industry.”47 Wellesley’s success against
the French in Spain, and later at Waterloo, made him “England’s greatest soldier-hero.”48
Weinstein “Industrial Light and Magic,” 22. Excerpts from the critics and the appropriate
citations are provided later in this essay.
42
43
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 103.
44
Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 225.
45
The Times 06 May 1842. As quoted in Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 225.
46
Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 225.
47
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 111.
48
Diana Hirsh, The World of Turner, 1775-1851 (New York: Time-Life Books, 1969), 63.
9
Although Turner’s depiction of a furnace opened to reveal the completed cast is
inaccurate, as it was cast in pieces rather than whole, it has great dramatic effect and rolls
together “allegory, bare fact, history, heroism and patriotism.”49 The caption that Turner
placed in the Academy catalog read, “an idea suggested by the German invocation upon
casting the bell: in England called tapping the furnace.”50 If John McCoubrey’s
explanation is correct, this is a reference to an epigraph that can be translated this way, “I
call to the living. I mourn for the dead. I strike thunderbolts from the sky.”51 And it
seems probable that the painting and note were intended to recall Wellesley’s heroism
and immortality by depict the triumph of his memory over death and his re-birth in
statuary.
One of the most interest aspects of The Hero of a Hundred Fights is that the scene
and symbolism described above were super-imposed onto an earlier painting. The
original painting has been dated ca. 1800-10, and featured a dark interior with large
pieces of machinery. Turner kept much of the earlier image intact when he reworked it;
simply “adding the great burst of light on the left and highlighting the still-life in the
foreground.52 Apparently Turner found the earlier image unremarkable and even
dissatisfying, but with the addition of an emblem of heroism, he found it worthy of
exhibition at the Royal Academy. In this single image we can catch a glimpse of just
how much Turner’s style changed through the more than sixty years of his career.
Man and his Technology vs. Nature
For Turner, nature could be terrifying and awe inspiring. Turner saw inclement
weather as an opportunity for heroism, a battleground where a man’s mettle could be
tested. In several of his later oils, he depicted a pitched battle between man and the
natural elements. These images compel a visceral, personal experience in the audience;
and the emotional response of the viewer is further heightened by the information that
49
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 111.
50
As quoted in Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 112.
51
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 113.
52
Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 245.
10
Turner experienced these moments himself. While much has been written by scholars
trying to determine the accuracy of these reports, perhaps the paintings and the tales are
even more evocative and revealing if Turner invented and imagined these heroic
moments for himself.
In this group of paintings, technology seems to be an ally, or tool, that
significantly improves men’s odds in their struggle against the elements. Hamilton points
out that there are numerous shipwrecks in Turner’s paintings, but “no wrecked
steamships;” all the wrecks are sailing ships or rowing boats.53 This observation leads
Hamilton to conclude that “Turner regarded steam as a manifestation of security, human
endeavor and hope.”54 While the argument that steamships were a symbol of “human
endeavor and hope” in Turner rings true, the concept of the steamer as a symbol of
security is unconvincing; perhaps the steamship does not make men safer, but instead
more successful and more competitive. In this group of paintings, Turner paints
situations in which technology elevated men and made them more worthy competitors for
Nature.
In 1832, Turner debuted Staffa, Fingal’s Cave; the first of his exhibited oil
paintings that gave prominent attention to the steamboat.55 Turner places his dark
steamship in an even darker storm that closes in and swirls menacingly around it. The
steamer has met a worthy rival; this struggle will test the vessel and all the men aboard
her. The fortitude of the steamship allows her men a fighting chance. The storm created
an opportunity for heroism or the makings of a tragic shipwreck. Turner exhibited the
painting alongside verses from Walter Scott: “Nor of a theme less solemn tells / That
mighty surge that ebbs and swells, / And still, between each awful pause, from the high
vault and answer draws.”56 Hamilton explores the context of these lines and concludes,
“Turner’s introduction of the character of the stout-hearted man-made steamship in
53
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 74.
54
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 74.
55
Weinstein, “Industrial Light and Magic," 40.
56
As quoted in Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 81.
11
contrast to the grandeur of nature is a direct parallel to Scott’s passage as a whole.”57
Perhaps it is not a “contrast” but a tension, a contest. The final verse of the Scott passage
ends, “That Nature’s voice might seem to say, / ‘Well hast thou done, frail Child of clay!
/ Thy humble powers that stately shrine / Task’d high and hard – but witness mine.’”58
Thus Scott, like Turner, depicts an agon between Nature and man, and as in Turner’s
account and his painting, Nature is insurmountable.
Almost fifteen years later, Turner described the incident that inspired Staffa,
Fingal’s Cave in a letter to James Lenox of New York, who purchased the painting. He
wrote, “a strong wind and head sea . . . rainy and bad-looking night coming on . . . The
sun getting toward the horizon, burst through the rain-cloud, angry, and for wind; and so
it proved, for we were driven for shelter into Loch Ulver.”59 After a lengthy struggle, the
two opponents are so evenly matched that neither has triumphed; rather than victory, the
exhausted ship and her captain seek only respite.
An alternative interpretation of the painting is possible. When Hamilton looks at
Staffa, Fingal’s Cave, he sees, “practically a flat calm,” and he marks that “the island is
being revealed in an opalescent light as the clouds pull back and the sun sets within a
halo” and interprets this as “a phenomenon that forecasts rain.”60 Hamilton concludes
that “the weather and sea conditions apparent in the painting do not follow Turner’s
recollection of them” and so he concludes that the painting is “a purposeful allegory.”61
Hamilton argues that “before accepting, as many critics have, that the steamship is in
trouble, we should reflect on the approving tone of Nature’s voice” in the verse from
Scott.62 This interpretation, although it enriches the dialogue about the painting, stands in
sharp contrast to Turner’s explanation, and so perhaps his intent.
57
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 82.
58
As quoted in Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 81.
59
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 81.
60
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 81.
61
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 79 and 81.
62
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 82.
12
Another oil painting that features a steamer is Snow Storm – Steam-Boat off a
Harbour’s Mouth Making Signals in Shallow Water, and Going by the Lead (exh. 1842).
When Turner exhibited this work, his note in the Royal Academy catalog included the
sub-title The Author was in this Storm on the night the Ariel left Harwich. Turner
insisted, “I got the sailors to lash me to the mast to observe it; I was lashed for four hours,
and I did not expect to escape, but I felt bound to record it if I did.”63 Adele Holcomb
called the famous story into question, and Butlin and Joll point out that it “bears a
suspicious resemblance to accounts of the maritime painter Joseph Vernet.”64 But the
veracity of the story may be less important than the fact that Turner wanted it to be
perceived as true; he used it as an opportunity to cast himself in a heroic role. While the
account may shadow Vernet’s experience, it most probably is an allusion to Book Twelve
of The Odyssey. Buffeted by a storm and facing the prodigious peril of the Siren,
Odysseus seals his crew’s ears with wax, and has them lash him to the mast where,
unable to respond, he can experience the full power of her song. Thus Turner’s account
paints him in the image of one of the most ancient archetypes of the hero, Odysseus. His
use of the words “author” and “record” to describe his role as painter remind us that
Turner in this adventure was not only Odysseys’’ but Homer’s as well. Regardless of the
accuracy of the Ariel story, Turner relished the vision of himself staring death in the face
and living to immortalize the experience.
According to Hamilton, in the painting the Ariel is in “a very tricky situation at
sea” but it is “not alone with the elements, nor far from its haven.”65 He postulates,
“There is the suggestion of another steamship beyond and perhaps of groynes or some
kind of sea wall on the right.”66 Hamilton treats the images as static and minimizes the
threat. But perhaps the image was intended to show the adversaries, the steamship and
her crew pitted against the storm and the sea, on the cusp of the climax of the long
Ruskin’s report of a conversation between the Rev. William Kingsley and Turner, as quoted in
Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 224.
63
64
Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 224.
65
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 82.
66
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 82.
13
struggle. This interpretation might be supported by the title, because “‘going by the lead’
means taking soundings in shallow water using a lump of lead on the end of the rope.”67
The storm hovers in the air and assaults the steamer and the crew from above, while the
shallows lurk below to ensnare them. Although the men and the ship are “almost
swamped,” and the situation seems desperate, the ship “is paddling away bravely.” 68 At
the same time, the men aboard her continue to meticulously and unflaggingly follow the
rules of navigation. It is this combination of skill, fortitude and technology which is
about to deliver the heroes from harm.
Another story, or perhaps myth, places Turner as a main character in Rain, Steam,
and Speed – The Great Western Railway. There were several variations in the tale, but
the basic form is that Lady Simon was returning to London in foul weather, a man on the
train stuck his head out the window to feel the full effect of the rain, then convinced her
to do the same, and when she saw Rain exhibited, it captured the experience so well she
realized that the man on the train had been Turner.69 Lady Simons story, as relayed to
George Richmond, was that the view outside the train included “a train coming in their
direction, through the blackness, over one of Brunel’s bridges, and the effect of the
locomotive, lit by crimson flame, and seen through driving rain and whirling tempest,
gave a peculiar impression of power, speed and stress.”70 Gage seems to give the story
some credence implying it might explain the innovative subject matter of Rain, Steam
and Speed. As Gage observes, “Turner was not the painter to invent a subject if he could
borrow one from another artist, and the isolation of his railway theme among British
landscapes of the period is remarkable.”71 But Gage also observes that George
Richmond’s version of Lady Simon’s account “is full of impossibilities” and Ruskin’s
version “is even more so.”72
67
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 82.
68
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 82.
69
Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 232.
70
As quoted in Gage, Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed, 16.
71
Gage, Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed, 14.
72
Gage, Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed, 16.
14
Elevating the Heroic Landscape
Turner was born into an era when, according to the art academies, the hierarchy of
respectable subjects still placed history painting above all others. History painting
included classical, religious, mythological, and allegorical themes. Other subject matter,
such as landscapes, portraits, still life, and scenes of everyday life were still seen as
inferior.73 In the mid seventeenth century, a push to elevate the genre of landscape to a
more respectable status was initiated in France. In the 1640’s several painters, including
Nicolas Poussin, came to believe that “landscapes could express the same powerful
emotions as the human dramas depicted in history paintings” and strove to achieve that
goal.74 In 1800, Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes published a book on landscape painting,
Elements de Perspective Practique. Valenciennes argued that historical landscape, which
was based on real nature, provided an aesthetic ideal. The success of Elements de
Perspective Practique led the French Academy to create a prize for historical landscape
in 1817. It has been argued that “the Industrial Revolution altered the traditions of rural
life” in the nineteenth century and “the hierarchy of subjects crumbled.”75 But what ever
the cause, landscape as a subject matter gained new respectability, which opened the door
for the plein air paintings of the Barbizon painters and the Impressionists.
The evolution away from more conventional historical painting and pretty
landscapes toward a more dynamic concept of landscape can be traced in Turner’s career.
It has been argued that Turner was consciously striving to elevate landscape painting to
the level of historical painting.76 Perhaps to achieve this end he depicted his panoramas
73
The Getty, “Brief History of the Landscape Genre,” internet, 02 September 2006, available:
http://www.getty.edu/education/for_teachers/curricula/landscapes/background1.html
74
Getty, “Brief History.”
75
Getty, “Brief History.”
76
Louis Hawes, review of J. M. W. Turner: ‘A Wonderful Range of Mind by John
Gage and Turner in the South: Rome, Naples, Florence by Cecelia Powell, Victorian Studies (Summer
1988): 576. Hawes makes a general comment that “In recent years many writers have emphasized Turner’s
aim of raising the status of landscape to that of history painting.” And he praises Gage for “bringing out
this theme more fully than most.”
15
with heroic elements. The scenes that, like a war, tested the mettle of a man and revealed
his bravery or his cowardice.
In one of his earliest known oil paintings, Turner sought to elevate a more humble
subject matter by heavily referencing a specific, respected, historical painting. James
Hamilton has argued that Turner consciously referenced Rembrandt’s Landscape with the
Rest on the Flight to Egypt when he depicted the everyday landscape of a manufacturing
process. Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll suggest that “the lighting” in Limekiln at
Coalbrookdale (c. 1797) “may derive from Turner’s study of Rembrandt’s small night
scene . . . Which Turner must have seen in the collection of his patron Sir Richard Colt
Hoare at Stourhead.”77 In fact, Hamilton goes as far as to call Coalbrookdale, “a direct
transcription of Rest on the Flight into industrial terms.”78 He bases this argument on
similarities in proportions, composition, light sources, strong chiaroscuro, and “an air of
timeless mystery.”79 It might be surprising that Turner chose to depict lime burning
rather than Coalbrookdale’s innovative iron works, but perhaps Turner saw something in
the more traditional process that made it a significant parallel for Rembrandt’s subject
matter. Rembrandt chose to show a midway point in a journey, so perhaps, to Turner,
lime burning represented a transitional point in the progression of technology and
industry. In any case, Limekiln at Coalbrookdale does seem to define “the eternity, as
opposed to the modernity, of industry.”80
As Turner matured and his work evolved, he turned away from the more
traditional forms of painting and began to imbue his paintings with an evocative
immediacy that did not portray emotional content, but actually pulled it from the
77
Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, entry no. 22. Butlin and Joll make a
compelling argument for an early date for Coalbrookdale, based on the “subdued tonality” of the piece.
This is in opposition to Thornbury, who dated the image c. 1814.
78
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 42.
79
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 42.
80
Hamilton, Turner and the Scientists, 43. Butlin and Joll offer some insight into the connection
between Turner and Coalbrookdale. They point out that there are no known drawings of Coalbrookdale by
Turner, but they are able to confirm a 1794 visit to Shopshire, and believe he may have also visited the area
in 1795, while traveling to and from Wales. They also suggest that perhaps Dr. Monro’s collection of small
watercolors and drawings in pen and ink by de Loutherbourg may have inspired Turner. The series
includes several images of Coalbrookdale, and Turner was interested enough in the cards to purchase fiftythree of them in 1833. (Butlin, entry no. 22)
16
audience. Even Turner’s hostile critics felt the impact of his paintings. The Snowstorm
flew in face of convention. In the words of Ruskin, “no distinction is left between air and
sea; that no object, nor horizon, nor any land-mark or natural evidence of position is
left.”81 The Art Union said of Snowstorm, “Before any further account of the vessel can
be given, it will be necessary to wait until the storm is cleared off a little. The sooner the
better.”82 Turner’s landscapes are so experiential that even those who question the
work’s merit are drawn into them.
Rain, Steam, and Speed was also guilty of “laxity of form” according to the Royal
Academy’s cannon, but it was also tremendously evocative.83 The Times wrote of Rain’s
“very sudden perspective” and left unanswered the question of “whether Turner’s
pictures are dazzling unrealities, or whether they are realities seized upon at a moment’s
glance.”84 The Morning Chronicle took a stronger position and said that Turner “actually
succeeds in placing a railroad engine and train before you, which are bearing down on the
spectator at the rate of fifty miles per hour.”85 But the most powerful response came
from the English novelist and critic William Makepeace Thackaray writing for Fraser’s
Magazine:
He has made a picture with real rain, behind which is real sunshine, and you
expect a rainbow every minute. Meanwhile, there comes a train down upon you,
really moving at the rate of fifty miles an hour, and which the reader had best
make haste to see, lest it should dash out of the picture and be away up Charing
Cross through the wall opposite.86
81
Ruskin, Modern Painters. As quoted in Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 225.
82
Art Union for 01 July 1842, as quoted in Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 225.
A critic form The Spectator 11 May 1844 felt that Turner’s “laxity of form” and “license of
effect” were “greater than people will allow.” As quoted in Butlin, 233.
83
84
The Times 08 May 1844. As quoted in Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 233.
85
Morning Chronicle 08 May 1844. As quoted in Butlin and Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W.
Turner, 233.
William Makepeace Thackaray Fraser’s Magazine June 1844. As quoted in Butlin and Joll,
The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, 233. Butlin only provides the title of the publication, but Weinstein offers
the name of the author and some details of his background. (Weinstein, 42) The exhibit was located in the
Royal Academy building in Trafalgar Square, which later became the National Gallery building.
86
17
Turner had turned a landscape into a testament of human endeavor and inspired a flood of
emotional responses.
Another reason that the landscapes from Turner’s mature period transcended their
genre is that he seemed to treat painting as a form of storytelling. Turner’s use of the
language of a narrative when he discussed Snow Storm – Steam-Boat off a Harbour’s
Mouth is indicative of this approach. For Turner, he was the “author” of a story. In fact,
many of Turner’s landscapes possess an intellectual content, an associative richness, that
[sic.] is unparallel among his contemporaries.”87 Gage traces this characteristic back to
Turners interest in mundane locales and subjects. He notes that Turner chose to depict
“the characteristic activities of the local people,” which produced “topography with a
narrative expressiveness.”88 Gage calls Turner’s “significant development” of the figure
one of the “many ways” in which he “brought the resonances of history to topographical
views.”89 According to Hawes, “no other landscape painter was more poetically oriented
than Turner.”90 The association of a few lines of poetry with a painting was one aspect of
how Tuner developed its narrative. Turner’s “Fallacies of Hope” fragments were
“written expressly as captions of various paintings” and “offer very telling clues to a least
some of the meanings intended by the painter.”91 For Turner, painting was deeply
entwined with both poetry and story telling.
Conclusion
As Turner continued to document the industrial revolution his focus was on the
emotional impact of his paintings. He led his audience to mourn the passing of his
traditional, beloved icons and at the same celebrate the new modern ones. He cast
87
Hawes, review of Gage and Powell, 576.
88
Ibid. Gage is a proponent of the interpretation of Turner as a romantic painter, so the fact that
Turner eschews the exotic is especially significant for his interpretation.
John Gage, J. M. W. Turner: “A Wonderful Range of Mind.” (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1987): 37. As quoted in Hawes, review of Gage and Powell, 576.
89
90
Hawes, review of Gage and Powell, 576.
91
Hawes, review of Gage and Powell, 576.
18
modern technology as man’s ally in his heroic struggles with the forces of the natural
world. And through his own valiant efforts, he transformed his landscapes into heroes
and elevated them to the level of historical paintings. In Turner’s paintings, the viewer
sees that heroism is eternal and transcends cultural shifts.
Heroic Turner Bibliography
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Available: http://www.artarchive.com/T/turner.html
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City Art Gallery 1968.
Butlin, Martin and Evelyn Joll. The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner. New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1977.
Danahay, Martin A. Review of J. M. W. Turner: Romantic Painter of the Industrial
Revolution by William Rodner. ISIS: Journal of the History of Science in Society
June 1999: 371-372.
Day, Fergus and David Williams, eds. Art: A World History. New York: DK
Publishing, 1997.
Egerton, Judy. Turner: The Fighting Temeraire. London: National Gallery
Publications, 1995.
Gage, John. Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed. London: Penguin Press, 1972.
Getty, The. “Brief History of the Landscape Genre.” Internet, 02 September 2006.
Available: http://www.getty.edu/education/for_teachers/curricula/landscapes/
background1.html
Gowing, Lawrence. Turner: Imagination and Reality. New York: Museum of
Modern Art, 1966.
Hamilton, James. Turner and the Scientists. Millbank, London: Tate Gallery
Publishing, 1998.
Hawes, Louis. Review of J. M. W. Turner: ‘A Wonderful Range of Mind by John
Gage and Turner in the South: Rome, Naples, Florence by Cecelia Powell.
Victorian Studies Summer 1988: 575-578.
19
Hirsh, Diana. The World of Turner, 1775-1851. New York: Time-Life Books, 1969.
Janson, H.W. History of Art. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2001.
“Joseph Mallord William Turner.” Columbia Encyclopaedia, 2003.
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Powell, Cecilia. “Turner: Action, Word and Image.” Review of J. M. W. Turner: ‘A
Wonderful Range of Mind’ by John Gage, The Apocalyptic Sublime by Morton
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Review of J. M. W. Turner by Peter Ackroyd. Publisher’s Weekly October 2005: 53.
Shanes, Eric. Turner’s England, 1810-38. London: Cassell, 1990.
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org.uk/britain/turner/
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Available:http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/turner/
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