William Turner

Joseph Mallord William Turner, R.A. (London 1775-1851) On the Medway pencil and watercolour 9 x 14¼ in. (23 x 26.2 cm.) John Edward Taylor; Christie's, London, 5 July 1912, lot 83 (240gns to Agnew's). Sir Ernest Debenham (1865-1952), London. with Agnew's, London, 1947. Sir William Worsley, Hovingham Hall. with Agnew's, London, 1970, from whom purchased for the presentcollection. THE PROPERTY OF A LADY (LOTS 140, 142-145) A. Wilton, The Life and Works of J.M.W. Turner, Fribourg andLondon, 1979, pp. 388-9, no. 765, illustrated. Leeds, City Art Gallery, Early English Watercolours, 1958, no.120. Andrew Wilton relates this watercolour in general terms to TheMedway of circa 1826, painted in connection with The Rivers ofEngland series but not engraved (Tate, Turner Bequest CCVIII-P;Wilton, op. cit., p. 386, no. 749; see also E. Shanes, Turner'sRivers, Harbours and Coasts, London, 1981, pp. 32-3, illustrated incolour). Both include shipping and a rainbow, and in Shane's words,'there is a very palpable sense of the warm, moist atmosphere aftera storm'. He suggests as a date more probably in the mid 1820s butalso sees the possibility that it could have been painted inconnection with the England and Wales project of the early1830s. John Edward Taylor (1830-1905) was the son of the founder of theManchester Guardian and was the sole owner of the newspaper by1856. He was the most important collector of the work of J.M.W.Turner in the second half of the 19th Century, owning both the Redand Blue Rigi (which sold in these Rooms, 5 June 2006, lot 53(£5,832,000)). He gave watercolours to the Whitworth Institute,Manchester, and the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, but itstill took twelve days to sell his collection at Christie's in July1912.

LOT 195 PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE MIDWESTERN COLLECTION JOSEPH MALLORD WILLIAM TURNER R.A. LONDON 1775 - 1851 MOUNTAIN LANDSCAPE, BONNEVILLE, SAVOY oil on panel 1,200,000—1,800,000 USD 13 3/4 by 19 1/4 in.; 34.9 by 48.9 cm. PROVENANCE Walter Fawkes, Farnley Hall, Yorkshire;Fawkes Sale, London, Christie's, 27 June 1890, lot 60, described as"Peasants Driving Sheep in the Apennines" (bt. by Vokins);E. Louis Raphael, London, by 1893;With Leggatt Brothers, London, 1927;By whom sold to the Hon. Mrs. Whitelaw Reid, Ophir Hall, New York,by 1927;Reid Sale, New York, American Art Association,14th-18th May 1935, lot 1179, described as "AScene in the Apennines" (bt. by E. and A. Silberman);With E. & A. Silberman Galleries, New York;With John Mitchell, New York;With Vixseboxse Art Galleries, Cleveland, Ohio, by 1945;From whom purchased by Dr. Louis A. Witzeman, Akron, Ohio, by1945;With Vixseboxse Art Galleries, Cleveland, Ohio, by 1968;From whom purchased by the father of the present owner EXHIBITED London, Royal Academy, 1893, no. 26;London, Guildhall, 1899, no. 11;Birmingham, City Museum and Art Gallery, 1899, no. 1 LITERATURE AND REFERENCES Sir W. Armstrong, Turner, London & New York 1902, p.218;M. Butlin and E. Joll, The Paintings of JMW Turner, New Haven 1984,p. 112, no. 148, reproduced pl. 153 CATALOGUE NOTE Purchased by Turner's most devoted patron and friend WalterFawkes, this landscape marks a turning point in the young painter'sconfidence as an artist and illustrates his growing ability toliberate his work from reliance upon topographical imitation,edging it towards a new manner of representation where value isbased upon colour and poetic possibility. At the time of itsexhibition one journalist noted that Turner's work heralded thestart of a new 'epoch in the whole history of art.' Based upon drawings made soon after 1802 this pastoral idyll,which depicts a particularly inviting and peaceful spot on a bendin the valley at Bonneville, insinuates nothing of the recentravages of war which had swept through the region. Turner made anumber of studies of this area of the Savoy, once known as thesymbolic 'gateway' to the Western Alps, which demonstrate not onlyhis delight in this view, but also suggests its importance to him.His handling of the landscape in the present work, with itsundulating forms and glimmering architectural strutures in themiddle distance, lend a tranquility and a timelessness to thecomposition which is seldom surpassed in his painting from thisperiod. The resting figures and grazing sheep in the foreground,and the glittering sun beating down on the shepherd's heads allserve to reinforce the arcadian atmosphere of the scene. This painting is based upon a sketch (London, British Museum,Wilton no. 354) of similar dimensions. The painting and the drawingappeared under the title of Bonneville at the Guildhallexhibition in 1899. Bonneville has been much changed by developmentin recent years but there does seem to be sufficient comparativematerial in Turner's oeuvre to support the identification. The samecastle on the mount above the town appears in another 1802 sketchrelated to the St Gothard and Mont Blanc sketchbook (London,Courtauld Institute Galleries, Wilton no. 355), which certainlyshows Bonneville in a distant view from the west, and which formedthe basis of an oil painting (Yale, Paul Mellon Collection). Thatcastle was identified in correspondence from February 2010 by LuisAntolinez of Les Amis du Chateau [de Bonneville] as the Chateau desTours, probably built by the Montvaugnard family in the 14thCentury. It remained in private hands until the French revolutionwhen it was confiscated. It subsequently fell into ruins, and wasreplaced by the present building, a rectangular block with cornerturrets, in 1865. Turner returned to Bonneville in 1836 and anumber of sketc

LOT 650 PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE COLLECTION JOSEPH MALLORD WILLIAM TURNER R.A. LONDON 1775 - 1851 LAGO MAGGIORE, ITALY Watercolor over pencil on laid paper watermarked with the fleurde lis; signed or inscribed lower left: Turner 20,000—30,000 USD measurements 175 by 235 mm; 6 7/8 by 9 1/4 in Description Watercolor over pencil on laid paper watermarked with the fleurde lis;signed or inscribed lower left: Turner PROVENANCE Sale, London, Sotheby's, 8 April, 1998, lot 58, to the presentowner CATALOGUE NOTE This watercolor dates from the middle of the 1790s and is basedon a work by John Robert Cozens (1752-1799). During this period DrThomas Monro commissioned the young Turner, along with ThomasGirtin (1775-1802), to copy watercolors and drawings. SinceNovember 1794 Cozens, due to his failing mental health, had been inthe care of Monro and the doctor was able to borrow drawings by theartist which Turner and Girtin would then copy. The presentwatercolor is based on a pencil drawing executed by Cozens on the10th October 1783 in Volume VI of The William BeckfordSketchbooks (Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester).

Joseph Mallord William Turner, R.A. (London 1775-1851) Bodiam Castle, Sussex pencil and watercolour, with gum arabic and with scratching out, onpaper 14¾ x 21½ in. (38 x 54.5 cm.) Provenance John Fuller, Rosehill Park, and by descent to Sir Alexander Acland-Hood; Christie's, London, 4 April 1908, lot85. Anonymous sale; Christie's, London, 16 November 1982, lot129. Literature Sir W. Armstrong, Turner, 1902, p. 243. W.G. Rawlinson, The Engraved Work of J.M.W. Turner, R.A., London,1908, 1, under no. 134. A. Wilton, The Life and Work of J.W.M. Turner, Fribourg and London,1979, no. 428, illustrated. E. Shanes, Turner's Rivers, Harbours and Coasts, London, 1981, no.10, illustrated. Exhibited London, International Exhibition, 1862, no. 1035. Lot Notes 'Turner here views the building from across the river Rother. Onthe left is The Red Lion Inn (now The Castle) which dates from thefifteenth century. Some women are drying the washing in the sun.Note how Turner makes the gate-post to the right of the bridgerepeat the curved line of the timber bridge-supports. The drawinghas a wonderful richness of tone and colour and the distant castleseems dream-like in the early morning haze.' (Shanes, op. cit., p.20.) For an artist whose early career and success was as a painter oftopographical watercolours, the actual castle, the ostensiblesubject of this work, is paradoxically relegated to the mistenveloped distance. This is a feature of a number of works of theearly to mid 1810s, including the oil painting of Rosehill Park,Sussex, of 1810, painted for the same patron (see below), LowtherPark, Evening and Lowther Park, Mid-Day, both exhibited at theRoyal Academy in 1810, Petworth, Dewy Morning, also exhibited atthe RA in 1810, and Somer Hill, exhibited at the RA in 1811 (M.Butlin and E. Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, New Haven andLondon, 2nd ed., 1984, pp. 78-80, 82-3, 130, nos. 111-3, 116, 211,all illustrated). In addition many of the watercolours painted tobe engraved by W.B. Cooke for the incomplete Views of Sussex,1816-20 (see Wilton, op. cit., pp. 347-9, nos. 423-31, severalillustrated, and Shanes, op. cit., pp. 18-20, nos. 2-11, allillustrated) show the same feature. The present watercolour is one of a number of works owned by andmainly commissioned by 'Mad Jack' John Fuller, M.P. for Sussex andproprietor of Rosehill Park, Sussex. His first purchase seems tohave been the oil painting known as Fishmarket on the Sands -Hastings, exhibited in Turner's own gallery in 1810 (Butlin andJoll, op. cit., pp. 73-4, no. 105, illustrated). Fuller's accounts, in the Sussex County Records Office (see J.Brooke, 'Letter to the Editor', Turner Studies, X, no. 2, Winter1990, p. 54) show three payments to Turner for £200, £220 and£191-7sh. on 26 July and 26 November 1810 and 8 July 1811; thefirst two probably represent payments for oil paintings includingFishmarket and Rosehill. Fuller went on to commission a series ofwatercolours of Sussex views, circa 1810-18, including a group tobe published as Views in Sussex with engravings by J.B. Cooke; thepublisher John Murray withdrew in 1818 after the publication ofonly five of the views, though the engravings of three furtherlandscapes were at least begun including that of 'Bodiham Castle,Sussex' (as it was inscribed). The first five prints were publishedas a projected Part I in 1820 with an emblematic frontispieceengraved by Turner himself with help from J.C. Allen (illustratedin Shanes, op. cit., p. 18) and a text by the painter RichardReinagle. The Prospectus described the engravings as 'displayingwith Truth and Effect the grand character of this picturesque partof the Coast.' The second part was to have shown 'Views in Hastingsand its Vicinity'. Turner also provided the watercolours for four large aquatints byJ.C. Stadler, probably done before the Views of Sussex watercoloursin 1810-11 (there are further accounts dating between 1810 and 1823in the Fuller papers and also in Turner's Hastings and Financesketchbooks of 1810, Turner Bequest, Tate Britain, CXI-59 andCXXII, but it is not possible to relate these to specific works.)(For the history of Fuller, the Views of Sussex and related workssee Wilton, op. cit., pp. 347-9, Shanes, op. cit., pp. 8-9, 13-15,18-21, and L. Herrmann, Turner Prints, Oxford, 1990, pp. 90-94,262, 274.) In common with several of the series, the present composition isbased on a drawing in the Vale of Heathfield sketchbook in theTurner Bequest at Tate Britain (TB CXXXVII-6v and 7 (see fig. 1)).Turner appears to have used this book on an earlier visit toRosehill, 1810, in connection with a first small group of views forFuller, mentioned by Farington (Diary, 21 April 1810). Bodiam (sometimes 'Bodiham') Castle was established by a grant fromRichard II to Sir Edward Dalyngrydge, a former knight of EdwardIII, in 1383. Ostensibly it was intended to defend East Sussexagainst French invasion during the Hundred Years' War but survivedfor 250 years without attack. Bodiam is a perfect example of a latemedieval moated castle with impressive towers, formidable walls anda broad moat. The castle is still extant and is run by the NationalTrust. We are grateful to Martin Butlin for his help in preparing thiscatalogue entry.

Joseph Mailord William Turner: "Stamford. Lincolnshire". Inscribed in print "Drawn by J. M. W. Turner R. A. /Engraved by Willm. Miller. 19 x 25 cm. Joseph Mailord William Turner, b. London 1775,d. Chelsea 1851 "Stamford. Lincolnshire". Inscribed inprint "Drawn by J. M. W. Turner R. A. / Engraved by Willm. Miller. Handcoloured lithopgraph. Visible size 19 x 25cm. Note Some foxing. The paper hasturned slightly brown.