Chapter Eight

The Importance of Landscape­

British Painting in the
Early Nineteenth Century

Runge/s pronouncement, in 1802/ that "everything tends to nature/" to escape the artificiality of civilization. In Ger­
towards landscape" (see page 169) / seems almost prophetic many (see page 162) Sturm and Drang (Storm and Stress)
in retrospect. In the following decades landscape paint­ writers such as Goethe and Schiller had drawn parallels
ing would grow and flourish until, by the middle of the between human emotions and nature/s "moods" (a phe­
nineteenth century, it was one of the most popular paint­ nomenon that would later be called the pathetic fallacy) .
ing genres in Europe. Landscape even became an accepted Two decades later, German Romantic writers and artists
discipline in most academies, although it never quite gained such as Wackenroder, Kosegarten, Friedrich, and Runge
the prestige of history painting. saw nature as manifesting the divine. In Britain, meanwhile,
The rise in importance of landscape painting was not con­ the naturalist movement was related to the development
fined to Gemlany, but occurred in most western European of regional tourism and had a distinct nationalist dimension.
countries, as well as North America. Yet, perhaps, nowhere
was that rise more dramatic than in early nineteenth-cen­
tury Britain. This is not to say that all British painters suddenly Nature Enthusiasm in Great Britain
turned to landscape, or even that landscape painting came
to dominate the Royal Academy exhibitions. But to poster­ The French Revolution of 1789 and the subsequent
ity the landscape painters of the late Georgian era (see Georgian Napoleonic wars put an end to the Grand Tour (see The
Britain, page 74) came to define this period at the expense Grand Tour, page 51). Traveling to the Continent became
of artists working in all other genres . difficult and dangerous . British tourists, who had previ­
A growing awareness of nature, beginning around 1770/ ously flocked to Italy, were redirected to the south coast
fueled the renewed interest in landscape painting. Although of England, to the Lake District in the northwest, and to
often seen as an integral part of the Romantic Zeitgeist, or Scotland. Except for the occasional Gothic building or
spirit of the age, the new enthusiasm for nature had diverse ruin, these destinations had limited cultural riches, but
origins and attributes. In France (see page 124) / the writer­ their natural beauty was astounding.
philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau had advocated a "return This beauty seemed the more precious since large tracts
of the British countryside were now claimed by industry:
coal mines, textile mills, lime kilns, forges, and the like.
J. M. W. Turner, Salisbury Cathedral Seen from the Cloister, c. 1802. While most people recognized the utility of such estab­
(Detail of FIG. 8- 10). lishments and some even admitted to their occasional

Nature Enthusiasm in Great Britain 181

8-1 John Laporte, A Pithead 11ear an Estuary, 1809 . Watercolor, 12% x 17Y8" (31.4 x 43.5 cm ). Elton Collection , lronbridge Gorge Museum, Shropshire.

sublimity, they nonetheless regretted the loss of the old praised nature's power to inspire, move, and teach people
pastoral England. William Blake lamented the presence of about themselves. In one of his best-known poems, "lines
the "dark Satanic mills .. . in England's green and pleas­ Written at a Small Distance from My House/' he asserted
ant Land. " The poet Anna Seward ( 1748-1808), shocked that a walk in the fields on a beautiful spring day was worth
by the ugly mines at Coalbrookdale in the English Mid­ more than "fifty years of reason ."
lands , felt that the region's "grassy lanes" and "woodwild
glens" had been "violated."
Artists' renderings of industrial regions evoke a bleak , The Picturesque
flowerless countryside , its skies filled with dark and dirty
smoke . A watercolor by John Laporte ( 1761-1839) shows Eighteenth-century Grand Tour travel guides had focused
several buildings guarding the entrance to a mine shaft on the history of cities and monuments . But the new crop
(FIG. 8-1 ). Eerily silhouetted against a sulfurous sky, they of nature-seeking British tourists wanted guides that
dominate a barren landscape. described natural scenery. To write such guides , a richer
As British tourists began to explore the as yet unspoiled descriptive language was needed. Traditional aesthetic
reaches of their own country, their attention shifted from categories such as "beautiful" and "sublime" no longer
culture to nature . Their travel goals , too , changed. Previ­ sufficed, and a new category, "picturesque / ' was
ously, a young gentleman would tour Europe to gain some introduced .
worldliness and perhaps make valuable contacts with fel­ Picturesque , meaning "like a picture/' was not a new
low Britons. Now, travel became a more intimate, even word in the English language. In the seventeenth and eigh­
solitary activity, important not for networking but for teenth centuries it had been applied to any scene that was
reflecting on life. Travel gradually became associated with suitable for a painting. It was also used in connection with
self-discovery. The poet William Wordsworth ( 1770-1850) a new style of garden design that had been introduced in

182 The Importa nce oj Landscape-British Painting in the Early Nineteenth CwtUlY
8-2 Plan of Versailles (gardens, palace , and town ) by Pierre Le Pautre , 1660s. Engraving , Bibliotheque Nationale,
Departement des Estampes et de la Photograph ie , Paris.

England in the t 720s. This new "English" garden differed garden in England took its irregular layout from nature
dramatically from the traditional "French" garden, which itself. Instead of straight paths, geometric flower beds,
was fashionable throughout Europe. While the latter was fountains, and shorn hedges, the "English" garden had
laid out according to a geometric plan-for example at winding paths, irregularly shaped ponds, and large trees,
the Palace of Versailles (FIC. 8-2)-the modern "Iandskip" left to grow freely, as at Heveningham Hall, Suffolk

The Picturesque 183

8-3 Lancelot ("Capability") Brown, Plan for the garde ns of Heveningham Hall , Suffolk, 1762. CountlY life , London.

8-4 FUr11CSS Abbey Illustration in William Cilpin , Observations, Relative Chiefly to Picturesque Beauty,
Made in the Year 1772, 011 Several Pat'ts of Englatd (Lo ndo n, 189 2 ). Dumbarton Oaks Research library,
Washington , DC

184 The IlIlportance of Landsca pe-Britisl) Painting il1 the Early Nineteenth Cel1tury
 ~~ The Popularity of Watercolor: Amateurs and
Professionals

In his poem "The Brothers" Wordsworth wrote facetiously

t..':i"''­ about "These Tourists [who]. .. Upon the forehead of a
t.\.. t.\ jutting crag/Sit perch'd with book and pencil on their
knee ,!And look and scribble, scribble on and look." Sketch­
.... ~ ing was a favorite pastime of the numerous travelers in the
~t.~ rural regions of Britain . Gilpin had encouraged this prac­
~ ....
~l..~ .. ,
tice, both by his own example and through his Three Essays:
~, l.. On Pict~lresque Beauty, on Picturesque Travel, and on Sketching Land­
t. scape ( 1792 ).
Sketching was done in pencil (compare Wordsworth's
tourists ) or watercolor, which became a popular medium
in Britain towards the latter part of the eighteenth cen­
tury (see Watercolor, below ). Requiring no more than a
sketchbook, brushes, and a box of color cakes, watercolor
was perfectly suited to working outdoors . Moreover, this
transparent, water-based medium lent itself well to the
depiction of nature and natural phenomena-water, clouds,
and fleeting atmospheric effects.
Sketching was an amateur as well as a professional prac­
tice . Amateur artists made watercolors of favorite places
as private souvenirs. Professionals made drawings , water­
(FIC. 8-3). Landscape architects of the time designed gar­ colors, or, on occasion , oil paintings of well -known sites
dens to have multiple "picturesque" views for visitors to to sell to tourists . To meet the high demand for such top­
enjoy. When the well-known garden planner Lancelot ographicallandscapes, their work was frequently reproduced
(nicknamed "Capability") Brown (1716-1783) offered his in prints (engravings or lithographs ), which were sold indi­
services to the Earl of Scarborough at Heveningham, he vidually or bound in albums.
promised that he would design his garden "with Poet's feel­ Amateurs and professionals alike joined "sketching clubs"
ing and with Painter's Eye." and "watercolor societies ," which played an important
The schoolmaster, amateur printmaker, and writer
William Gilpin (1724- 1804) was one of the first to apply
the term "picturesque" to landscape scenety. In several trav­
elogues, illustrated with his own prints, Gilpin suggested
that Britain had areas of countryside that resembled the Watercolor
canvases of such seventeenth-century landscape artists as
Claude Lorrain, Jacob van Ruisdael ( 1628/9-1682), and Watercolor, or aquareJ/e in French, is a paint medium in
Salvator Rosa ( 1615-1673). Cilpin's books helped his read­ which the pigment is mixed with a water-soluble glue. It
ers to appreciate picturesque scenery by pointing out the is produced in liquid form (in tubes) or in dried cakes, to
which the artist adds water to obtain a color of the
painterly aspects of landscape, such as composition, light
desired strength . In true watercolor, the paint is applied
and dark contrasts , form, texture, etc. The picturesque, to a sheet of paper in the form of "washes," thin
for Gilpin, fell somewhere between the beautiful and the transparent layers of color. Non-transparent watercolors
sublime . It lacked the ideal perfection of the former and are referred to as "gouaches." To obtain complete
coverage, extra "body" is given to the colors by the
the awesomeness of the latter, but it held a special fasci­
addition of an opaque white .
nation for the viewer. While the use of water-based colors on paper has its
Furness Abbey (FIC. 8-4), an illustration in one of Gilpin's roots in medieval manuscript illumination, watercolor
travel books , exemplifies the picturesque . This picture of painting as we know it today did not come into its own
until the seventeenth century. Initially, artists ground
a moonlit Gothic ruin in the middle of the woods is marked
their own pigments and mixed them with Arabic gum or
by its dramatic contrasts of light and dark, and by its other glues, or both . In 1780 the Reeves family firm in
emphasis on bizarre forms and irregular surfaces . Ruins London began to produce watercolor cakes in portable
were favorite picturesque motifs because they gave, as boxes. This made watercolor the perfect outdoor
sketching medium. It also contributed to the use of
Gilpin wrote, "consequence to the scene." A ruin's rough watercolors by amateurs.
edges and battle scars were testament to the ravages of
time and history.

The Popularity of Watercolor: Amateurs and Professionals 185

8-5 Thomas Girtin, Guisborough Priory, 1801. Watercolor, 26 x 19" (66 x 48.3 cm). National Callery of Scotland, Edinburgh.

186 The Importance of Landscape-British Painting in the Early Nineteenth Century

artistic as well as social role. Because of its reputation as ing, at the turn of the eighteenth to the nineteenth
both an amateur and a commercial medium, however, water­ centuries, as well as the variety of its subject matter and
color was given short shrift at the Royal Academy exhibitions. aesthetic modality (see Landscape Painting-Subjects and
Watercolors were often "skied," which meant that they Modalities, page 190). The short-lived Girtin (he died at
were hung so high that nobody could see them. The newly age twenty-seven) began his career as a topographical
established watercolor societies and sketching clubs artist, drawing popular tourist sites to illustrate books
took to organizing their own shows, some of which and travel guides. Between 1796 and 1801 he went on a
became eminently fashionable. This was especially true for number of sketching tours of different parts of England
the exhibitions of the Society of Painters in Water-Colours and Scotland. During one of these, he made the water­
(later the Royal Watercolour Society), founded in 1804, color Guisborough Priory (FIC. 8-5), showing a Gothic ruin
which rivaled the Royal Academy shows in popularity against a landscape background. Although this is a top­
and prestige. ographical landscape, it is also fashionably picturesque.
Not only does it depict the type of scenery that was
favored by William Gilpin and other theorists of the pic­
Thomas Girtin, John Sell Cotman, and the Pictorial turesque (see page 185), but it is also marked by a dramatic
Possibilities of Watercolor composition, strong light and dark contrasts, and irreg­
ular surface textures.
Two of the leading watercolorists at the turn of the eigh­ Bamburgh Cast/e, Northumberland (FIC. 8-6), painted
teenth century were Thomas Girtin (1775-1802) and c. 1797-9, is a watercolor in a quite different mode­
John Sell Cotman (1782-1842). Their works exemplify sublime rather than picturesque . By dwarfing the human
the importance of watercolor, rivaling that of oil paint­ figures that inhabit it, Girtin has emphasized the castle's

Girtin and the Vogue for the Painted Panorama

It would be wrong to think of British watercolorists as artists (FIG. 8-2-1). These show how the artist prepared careful
working exclusively on a small scale. Several of them became perspective studies, perhaps with the help of some
involved in large-scale commercial projects that exceeded in mechanical device, so as to create the illusion that the entire
size the enormous history paintings that contemporary figure panorama was seen from a single identifiable viewpoint.
painters such as West and Fuseli put on public view. While such elaborate perspective constructions were a
Girtin's Eidometropolis of 1802 was the artist's response to prerequisite for the verisimilitude of panorama paintings, the
a popular vogue, which began in the late eighteenth century, illusion of reality that Girtin attained in his Eidometropolis
for painted panoramas-huge, circular topographic paintings was apparently due to other factors as well. Contemporary
that showed 360-degree panoramic views of famous sites. reviewers especially praised the artist's skill in suggesting
Panorama paintings were skilfully mounted and carefully lit so effects of light and atmosphere .
that viewers, standing in the center, would
receive a strong illusion of reality. Like the
Shakespeare and Milton galleries of Boydell 8-2-1 Thomas Girtin, View oj London, presumably a sketch for the Eido»letropolis,
and Fuseli, panoramas were a form of popular 1801-2. Pen and watercolor on paper, 14 x 20" (35 x 50 cm). British Museum, London.
entertainment, in which spectators paid "per
view." Although generally painted in tempera
or oils, panorama paintings required the skills
of topographic watercolorists, who made the
preliminary on-the-spot drawings on which the
final painting was based .
Girtin's Eidometropolis was a 360-degree
view of London that was mounted in a rented
locale in Spring Gardens. In a newspaper
advertisement, the artist claimed that his
panorama showed, "to the greatest advantage
the Thames, Somerset House, the Temple
Gardens, all the churches, bridges, principal
buildings, etc., with the surrounding country to
the remotest distance, interspersed with a
variety of objects of great Metropolis."
Although, like most panorama paintings,
Eidometropolis is now lost, some of Girtin's
preliminary drawings have been preserved

Thomas Girtin, John Sell Cotman, and the Pictorial Possibilities oj Watercolor 187
8-6 Thomas Girtin, Ba111burgh Castle, Northumberland, c. 1797-9. Watercolor, gouache, and pencil on paper, 2112 x 17%" (54 .9 x 45 . 1 cm ).
Tate Britain , London.

188 The Importance oj Landscape-British Pail1ting in the Early Nineteenth Century

8-7 John Robert Cozens, LAke Albano and Castel Gandolfo, c.1783-8. Watercolor on paper, 1914 x 26%" (489 x 67.9 cm ) Tate Britain , London.

colossal size; and by placing the dark mass of the archi­ from Cirtin's Bamburgh Castle, nevertheless shows what
tecture against a threatening sky, he has created a sense Cirtin may have learned from Cozens's work. Towering
of foreboding and apprehension. Cirtin's interest in the forms, dwarfing the human beings in their presence, as
sublime may have been aroused by his acquaintance with well as threatening skies and an emphasis on darkness­
the watercolors and drawings of John Robert Cozens these are some of the characteristics that the two works
(1752-1798), an artist of the generation of Blake and have in common .
Fuseli. From 1794 to about 1798, Cirtin regularly visited Cirtin's Village along a River Estuary in Devon (FIC . 8-8) has
the home of Dr Thomas Monro, a physician attached to neither the picturesque qualities of Guisborough Priory nor
the Bethlehem insane asylum in London, who treated the sublimity of Bamburgh Castle . Instead, it shows a flat,
Cozens for the mental illness from which he suffered coastal landscape, with a village located between the two
during the last years of his life . Monro, an avid collec­ arms of an estuary. Numerous sailboats are moored by the
tor of contemporary prints and watercolors, encouraged village, and a new boat is being built on a wharf on the
young painters to study and copy the works in his col­ left side. The artist has carefully rendered light and atmos­
lection . So many artists took advantage of this opportunity pheric effects in an effort to create an image that evokes
that his home came to be referred to as the "Monro Acad­ reality in a convincing manner. The term "naturalism" is
emy/l At the time Cirtin frequented the doctor's home, generally used to describe this aspect of Cirtin's work. It
the latter had temporary custody of many of Cozens's ushered in a new trend in early nineteenth-century British
works , which he asked Cirtin and others to copy. Coz­ landscape painting that would culminate in the work of
ens, whose career for the most part preceded the French John Constable (see page 197) .
Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, had traveled widely Unlike Cirtin, who was born in London, Cotman came
in Switzerland and Italy, where he had become fascinated from NorWich, a town in the county of Norfolk, some
with the sublime . His watercolor of Lake Albano and Cas­ 80 miles north-east of the capital. Norwich, in the early
tel Gandolfo (FIC . 8-7), though different in subject matter nineteenth century, was an important center of landscape

Thomas Girtifl, John Sell Cotman, and the Pictorial Possibilities oj Watercolor 189
 Landscape Painting-Subjects and Modalities

The term "landscape painting" covers a wide variety of SUBJECT CATEGORIES

images, whose only common denominator is that they depict
Historical landscape A landscape scene, set in the past,
outdoor scenery. Landscape paintings may feature
furnished with figures that are part of a mythological, biblical,
mountains, woods, fields, seas, rivers, or cities. They may
historical, or literary narrative.
include human figures and animals or they may be devoid of
them . They may be set in the present or they may be
Mountainous landscape
reconstructions of the past drawn from imagination .
A landscape painting may present an apparently truthful
Seascape View of the sea, with or without boats (if boats
rendering of reality; or it may be the product of the artist's
dominate, we speak of marine painting) .
imagination. Its aim may be to delight, to awe, to charm, to
move, or to inform the viewer. In addition, landscape
Panoramic landscape Vast view of a landscape seen from an
paintings may be categorized by subject matter or by their
elevated point.
"aesthetic modality," that is, the particular effect on the
viewer that the artist has aimed at.
VVooded landscape
Certain subjects lend themselves well to certain
modalities. Thl..!s historical landscapes are often in the ideal
Pastoral or Bucolic landscape Landscape that represents
mode. Mountc.:inous landscapes and seascapes (particularly
pastures and fields, usually including rustic cottages,
stormy seas) may be sublime. Pastoral or bucolic landscapes
peasants working on the land, perhaps with grazing cattle.
are generally naturalistic and townscapes topographic.
There are also geographic links. Ideal landscapes often
Townscape Painting that contains information on the visual
show Italian scenery, while sublime landscapes are set in the
appearance of a town.
Swiss Alps. The picturesque is associated with England, while
the Low Countries, especially the Netherlands, offer the best
AESTHETIC MODALITIES
scenery to naturalist artists.
Beautiful or Ideal
Sublime
Picturesque
Naturalistic
Topographic

8·8 Thomas Girtin, Village along a River Estuary in Devoll , 1797- 8. Watercolor over pencil on oatmeal·color paper, 11j;16 x 20~16" (29.3 x 51.6 em).
National Callery of Art , Washington , DC.

190 The Importance of Landscape-British Painting in the Early Nineteenth Century

8-9 John Sell Cotman, Mousehold Heath, Norwich, c. 1809-10. Pencil and watercolor on paper, 11 Y4 by 17Y2" (28.5 x 44.5 cm ). Norwich Castle
Museum , Norwich .

painting. Indeed, so many landscapists were active in this Joseph Mallord William Turner
small town that it became common to speak of the "Nor­
wich SchooL" Cotman was one of the leading figures of Nearly all British landscape painters began their careers
this school and one of the few to specialize in water­ as watercolorists, and James Mallord William Turner
color. Although, like Girtin, he started his career producing (1775-1851), the best-known nineteenth-century English
picturesque watercolors for the British tourist market, he landscapist, was no exception. Yet, while he remained
later became more attracted to a naturalist mode of land­ drawn to watercolor all his life, Turner also turned to oils.
scape painting, as is seen in his Mousehold Heath, Norwich For he was determined to make a career within the Royal
(FIC . 8-9). The heath was a favorite subject of Norwich Academy, where watercolor was a "lesser art" and oil paint­
School artists, and Cotman treated it in several water­ ing alone was deemed worthy of serious attention. Turner
colors and drawings. The watercolor shown here is painted did not merely study at the Academy, but also became an
on coarsely textured paper, which the artist has used to academician in 1802 and later served as Professor of Per­
his advantage to suggest the barren ruggedness of the spective (the usual teaching subject of landscape painters)
terrain . One marvels how, in a work that measures no from 1807 until 1837.
more than 11 Y4 inches by 17Y2, he has managed to cre­ Turner's determination to make a career within the Royal
ate an illusion of the vast, undulating expanse of the Academy was directly related to his ambition of raising
heath, with its scrubby green brush set off against the the status of landscape to equal that of history painting.
red earth. The minuscule houses, dotting the landscape To further this effort, he pursued a two-pronged strategy.
in the middle distance, and the tiny windmills silhouet­ First, he tried to emulate renowned landscapists of the sev­
ted against the pale blue sky help to convey this sense enteenth and eighteenth centuries-"Old Masters" such
of scale; they also hint at the smallness of man in the face as Claude Lorrain and Jacob van Ruisdael, who were well
of the immensity of nature. represented in British collections. Second, he imbued his

Joseph Mallord William Turner 191

 paintings with narrative and allegorical meaning, treating
landscape as if it were history painting.
In the course of his career Turner experimented with
several aesthetic modes, ranging from the topographical
and the picturesque to the beautiful and the sublime . His
early watercolor Salisbury Cathedral Seen Jrom the Cloister (FIG.
8-10) combines the meticulous accuracy of topographi­
cal drawing with a dramatic composition that brings out
the scene's picturesque qualities. The work resembles
Cirtin's watercolor of Guisborough Priory (see FIG . 8-5). Born
in the same year, Cirtin and Turner both frequented
"Monro's Academy" and, until Cirtin's premature death,
were major rivals.
While Turner keenly understood the marketability of
the picturesque, he preferred the ideal and sublime . As
a young artist, he especially admired the ideal beauty of
the landscapes of Claude Lorrain . In his Dido Building
Carthage, otherwise known as The Rise oj the Carthaginian
Empire (FIG. 8-11), Turner tried to emulate Lorrain's famous
views of seaports (FIG . 8-12). like Lorrain, he composed
his painting around a central body of water, flanked by
unequal groupings of buildings and bathed in a warm ,
golden light.
Dido Buildil1g Carthage exemplifies Turner's dual method
of raising the status of landscape to equal that of history
painting. Paraphrasing the work of an Old Master, it is
8-10 J. M. W. Turner, Salisbury Cathedral Sem from the Cloister, also filled with historical references and visual metaphors.
c. 1802. Watercolor, 26 1 Y I 6 x 19" (68 x 49.6 cm ) Victoria and Albert The painting is an imagined rendering of the ancient city
Museum , London. of Carthage on the north African coast. In his Ael1eid the
Roman poet Virgil had related how Queen Dido of Tyre
8-1 I J. M. W. Turner, Dido Building Carthage, or The Rise of the
Ca,ihagil'lian Empire, 1815. Oil on canvas , 5'1 " x 7'7" ( 156 x 2.32 m). (seen on the left bank of the river) fled her country after
National Gallery, London. the murder of her husband, and founded Carthage. Turner's

192 The Importance of Landscape-British Pa/nti11g /11 the Early Nineteenth Century
 audience, well versed in the Classics, would have appre­
ciated his historical and symbolic references. The magnificent
sunrise and the dynamic activity on the left bank convey
a sense of hope and expectation at the rise of the new city_
The deserted right bank with its magnificent tomb, pre­
sumably of Dido's husband, is a reminder of past tragedies.
TIle tomb may hint as well at the ominous future of Carthage,
which was to be annihilated by the Romans in the noto­
rious Punic Wars.
While in Dido Building Carthage Turner embraced the
Classical ideal, he was ultimately more drawn to the sub­
lime. Beginning around 1800, he sought to express the
sublimity of nature by emphasizing its immense powers _
The Shipwreck, of 1805 (FIC . 8-13), represents a storm at sea.
In the right foreground, a large sailboat is about to cap­
size as its crew abandons ship. In the middle and far distance
other boats are desperately trying to stay afloat as they
are tossed to and fro by the turbulent sea. The Shipwreck
speaks of man's insignificance in the face of nature. It is a
meditation on the frailty of human life and the vanity of
human endeavor. like most of Turner's early seascapes, it
was indebted to seventeenth-century Dutch marine paint­
ing, notably the works by Willem van de Velde (1633-1707),
which were widely admired in Britain . Van de Velde's Ships
on a Stormy Sea (FIC. 8-14), owned by one of Turner's patrons,
may serve as an example of the kind of paintings the artist
was attempting to emulate .
Imbuing his landscapes with meaning was for Turner
a lifelong preoccupation. The various means he used to
8-12 Claude Lorrain, The Port of Ostia with the Embm-katlon of
St Paula, 16 39-40. Oil on canvas , 6' 1 1" x 4'9" (2.1 1 x 1.45 m). Museo make meaning, as well as the heterogeneous meanings he
del Prado , Madrid. attempted to convey, make his work incredibly varied and
diverse. While his early works, such as Dido Building Carthage,

8-13 J. M. W. Turner,
The Shipwreck, 1805.
Oil on canvas, 6 7Y2 x 95"
( 1.76 x 2.46 m )
Tate Britain , London.

Joseph Mallord William Turner 193

8-14 Willem van de Velde, SIJips on a StonilY Sea, 167 1-2. Oil on canvas, 4'2" x 6'4" ( 1.32 x 1.92 m ). Toledo Museum of Art, Tol ed o, Ohio.

8-15 J. M. W. Turner, Snow Storm-Hannibal Crossing the Alps, 1812 . Oil on canvas , 4'9" x 7'9" ( 1.46 x 2.38 m ). Tate Britain, Clore Callery for
the Turner Collection, London.

194 The Importance oj Landscape-British Pain ting in the Early Nineteenth Century
tend to teach general life lessons, his later works often to claim damages from insurers (they could not do so if
convey specific political or social messages . Snow Storm­ the slaves died on board) . Although the painting was based
Hannibal Crossing the Alps (FIC. 8-15), for example, is a on an event that had occurred in the early 1780s, it had
historical landscape that depicts the army of Hannibal, not lost its relevance in the 1840s. The slave trade had
general of Carthage during the Punic Wars, caught in a been officially abolished in Britain in 1807, but slavery
snowstorm as he is crossing the Alps to invade Italy. The was still widely practiced. Moreover, the painting could
painting was inspired both by Turner's trip to Switzerland be interpreted as a comment on all man's inhumanity against
in 1802 and by a recent political event, namely Napoleon's man for the sake of material profit.
invasion of Italy in 1800 (see page 120). When Turner Turner's painting is difficult to read at first. It is a chaos
sent the painting to the Royal Academy exhibition, he of brushstrokes in different colors-red, yellow, various
included a poem of his own for the catalogue. In it, he shades of white, and black. Only gradually does one dis­
condemned Hannibal for wasting so many lives in his cover a three-master, silhouetted against the sunset. Then,
futile attempt to conquer Rome. The poem and Turner's among the dark smudges that mark the high waves, one
painting indirectly commented on Napoleon, the "new sees groping manacled hands and bodies torn apart by
Hannibal," whose efforts to conquer Europe were widely monstrous fish. The full meaning of the painting now
condemned in Britain. becomes clear. Colors and brushwork acquire a new sig­
While Snow Storm-Hannibal Crossing the Alps comments nificance, because red hints at blood black at disaster and
t t

on contemporary events by means of a reference to the the chaotic application of the paint at the cataclysmic
Classical past, Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying nature of the event.
(FIC. 8-16) depicts an event in recent British history. The Hannibal Crossing the Alps and Slavers display a much
painting, exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1840, shows looser painting style than Shipwreck . Both paintings mark
depraved British slave traders drowning sick slaves in order a progressive trend toward pictorial freedom that would

8- 16 J. M. W. Turner, Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying, 1840. Oil on canvas, 35/'8 x 54 Y'4" (9 1 cm x 1.38 m ). Museum of Fine Arts , Boston .

Joseph Mallord William Turner 195

 1

8-17 J. M. W. Turner, Rain, Steam and Speed-The Grea t WestcrH Railway, 1844 . Oil on canvas, 35/8 x 49" (9 1 cm x 1.2 2 m). Nati o nal Ca ll ery, London.

culminate in Turner's wo rks of the 1840s . During his As for Mr Turner, he has out-prodigied all former
final years Turner became inc re as ingly interested in prodigies. He has made a picture with real rain,
reducin g landscape to its basic el ements o f water, light, behind which there is real sunshine, and you
and atmosphere. His works became abs tract to the po int expect a rainbow. Meanwhile there comes a train
where they begin to resemble twe n tieth -ce ntury non­ do wn upon you, really moving at the rate of fifty
objective painting . Ra in, Steam and Speed- The Grea t Western miles an hour ... All these wonders are performed
Railway ( FIC . 8-1 7) , ex hibite d at the Royal Academy in with means not less wonderful than the effects are.
1844, exe mplifies this trend . As its title indicates, the The rain, in the astounding picture called "Rain­
painting is foremost about capturing effects of atmos­ Steam-Speed", is composed of dabs of dirty putty
phere an d movement; its subject, a trai n, is secondary. slapped on the canvas with a trowel ; the sunshine
Turner has used an extraordinary technique in this paint­ scintillates out of very thick, smeary lumps of
ing . In some places , thinned oil paint is used in the chrome yellow.
manner of a watercolor wash; in others the paint is plas­
tered on the canvas to form a heavy impasto . The variegated Turner relished being seen as a sort of magician who
surface creates an active viewing experience, in which created miracles out of paint. During the later part of his
the viewer shifts back and forth between experiencing career, he would work on his paintings as they were already
the painting as a representation of reality and seeing it hanging on the walls of the Royal Academy. The open­
as a canvas covered with paint. Turner's masterful use of ing day of the exhibition was varnishing day, when most
paint to express almost tan gi ble atmospheric effects was artists came in to put a final coat of varnish on their paint­
greatly admire d in his time. The critic and novelist ings. Turner, however, used that day to finish off paintings
William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863) wrote in begun in the studio, eager for the public to see his virtu­
Frase r's Magazine: oso painting method .

196 The Importa nce oj Landscape-British Painting in the Early Nineteen th Cen tury
8-18 John Crooke Bourne, Maldel1l1ead Bridge, 1846. lithograph , 1 1 x 17" (29 x 43 cm ). Private Co ll ec tion , London.

In his Rain , Steam and Speed, Turner showed that even a John Constable
prosaic steam train could , under certain circumstances ,
produce the kind of delightful terror that Burke had defined John Constable ( 1776-1837), the other great English
as sublime . Indeed, his painting has a strong basis in real­ landscape painter of the nineteenth century, differed
ity as it depicts a Great Western Railway Company train greatly from Turner. Although the two artists were only
crossing Maidenhead bridge, which had rece ntly been one year apart in age, their works have little in common.
constructed under the direction of Isambard Ki ngdom Turner covered an extensive range of landscape subjects
Brunei (1806-1859). A contemporary topographical print and traveled widely both in Britain and Continental
(FIG. 8-18) by J. C. Bourne ( 1814-1896) g ives us a more Europe. Constable stayed close to home , painting the
technical view of this marvel of engineering, showing the countryside in his native East Anglia, a region north east
broad span of its arches, unprecedented at the time. Turner's of London bordered by the North Sea. Turner wanted
painting is not mechanically explicit, but it too celebrates to emulate the great ma sters and create landscapes of
modern technology. To him, as the title indicates, the mar­ historical significance. Constable's first aim was to ren­
vel of technology is speed. While it is impossible to represent der landscape naturalistically-even though , as we shall
speed in the static medium of painting, Turner suggests it see, his works were not necessarily "true" to reality. These
by rendering the bridge and the train in radical perspec­ differences notwithstanding , the two artists had one
tive. The side barriers of the bridge rush towards the common interest. Both were determined to elevate the
horizon , and the train seems to hurl itself forwards through stature of landscape painting within the Academy and,
the mist and steam. In front of the train , Turner adds a ultimately, to raise its position within the hierarchy of
hare , which is running for its life . While it provides some genres.
comic relief, it also reinforces the impression of speed since Constable was a late bloomer. The son of a wealthy
in Europe, at that time , hares were traditionally consid­ miller and flour me rchant , who resisted his son's artistic
ered the fastest animals . ambitions, he began painting as an amateur and was in his

101111 Cons table 197

early twenties when he finally embarked on a professional a ford in the river. On the left, a rustic cottage stands out
career. Admitted to the Royal Academy in 1799, he did against a dark green clump of trees . On the right, a grassy
not exhibit a single painting before 1802, by which time meadow enclosed by trees is punctuated by hay makers
Turner had already been accepted as a fully fledged aca­ and cows . The painting evokes the halcyon days of sum­
demician. It was not until 1820 that his work received mer, when everything moves at a leisurely pace. It is a
serious critical attention. bucolic scene that makes city dwellers long for the peace
Constable took a "naturalistic" approach toward land­ and quiet of country life.
scape painting, which meant that, rather than striving for When Constable exhibited this work in London in 1821,
ideal beauty, or for sublime or picturesque effects, he aimed however, the British countryside was far from peaceful.
at painting "believable" pictures that reminded viewers of Owing to the Industrial Revolution and the Napoleonic
familiar sights. His goal was to develop a "natural painture," wars, rural life in Britain had changed considerably. Heavy
which would faithfully represent the British countryside. taxation and a fall in agricultural prices had led to rural
To this end, he focused on pastoral landscapes, a category unrest. Farm laborers, unable to meet the needs of their
that had been largely neglected by seekers of the sublime families, were rioting everywhere, destroying property,
and picturesque . and lighting random fires. In the light of this, it would
Constable's The Hay Wain (FIC. 8-19) exemplifies the appear that The Hay Wain was not, in fact , a truthful rep­
artist's notion of "natural painture." It is one of a series of resentation of the British countryside but rather a nostalgic
"six-footers," painted in Suffolk between 1819 and 1825. reconstruction of an idyllic past. Indeed, Constable's pas­
With the help of these large-scale works, Constable hoped toral landscapes seem to have been aimed at recovering
to make his reputation as a landscape painter and to raise his own youth and that of the conservative middle-class
the respect for his pastoral scenes. The Hay Wain , like all and middle-aged visitors to the Royal Academy exhibi­
"six-footers," features the Stour, a partly canalized river tions who, like him, regretted the passing of the good
that bordered the Constable family lands. The painting is old days .
centered on two farmers riding an empty hay cart across To achieve the illusion of reality that his pictures con­

8-19 John Constable, The Hay Wa i11 , 1821. Oil on canvas, 4'3" x 6'1" ( 1.3 x 1.85 m). National Callery, London.

198 The Importa11ce of La11dscape-British Pai11ti11g in the Early Ni11eteenth Century

 ---

8-20 John Constable, Study oj Ci'TUS Clouds, c. 1822. Oil on canvas, 4 x 7" (11.4 x 17.8 cm) . Victoria and Albert Museum , London.

vey, Constable had developed his own method. Like all reproduced in FIC . 8-20, Constable has even indicated that
landscapists, he composed his paintings inside the studiO, it represents a "cirrus" cloud. In his finished paintings, Con­
using sketches made outdoors. But while most other artists stable tried to preserve the freshness of these outdoor
sketched in pencil or watercolors , Constable was in the studies . For The Hay Wain, he may have referred to two oil
habit of sketching outdoors in oils . The practice was not studies, one for the clear sky on the right, and another for
entirely unprecedented . The French artist Pierre Henri de the threatening sky on the left.
Valenciennes (see page 139) had begun to sketch in oils During his lengthy career, Constable painted hun­
during a stay in Italy in the early 1780s and had encour­ dreds of oil sketches, which clearly fall into two groups.
aged his students to do the same. In Britain, however, Some, like the cloud studies , were aimed at the direct
Constable seems to have been the first to embrace the oil observation of nature. Others were conceptual sketches ,
sketch. It was, to be sure, a complicated process, since in which the artist worked out a satisfactory composi­
paint in tubes was not yet available and the artist had to tion for his paintings. For his "six-footer" Flatford Mill,
store small amounts of paint in pig bladders to transport Suffolk (FIC. 8-21), exhibited at the Royal Academy in
it. To Constable, however, this was worth the effort, because 1812, Constable made four outdoor sketches , focusing
it made it easier to record accurately the effects observed on different elements in the landscape-the lock, the
in nature and to translate them faithfully into the finished mill, the trees, and the wooden pilings in the foreground
painting. (FIC. 8-22). In a fifth sketch, done in the studio (FIC. 8­
The beneficial effects of Constable's method may be 23), he worked out the composition of his painting. All
seen in the sky in The Hay Wain , which effectively suggests sketches are loosely painted in an almost impressionis­
the approach of a thunderstorm through its masterful depic­ tic manner and they are striking for their freshness and
tion of a gradually darkening sky. For many years, Constable immediacy. Yet Constable's contemporaries never saw
sketched the sky and clouds at different times of the day these works; they were intended for the artist's own use
and under varied weather circumstances. His cloud stud­ and were never shown.
ies are marvels of meteorological observation. Painted While today Constable's finished paintings may seem
outside, on small panels, each study is carefully annotated a little restrained in comparison with his freely rendered
with the time, date, and weather conditions. In the study preliminary sketches, in their own time they were often

101111 Constable 199

8-21 (above ) John
Constable, Flatford Mil/,
Suffolk, 1812 . Oil on canvas,
26 x 36" (66 x 92 .7 em)
Private Collection.

8-22 John Constable,

Flatford Mill from the Lock
(outdoor sketch ), c.1811.
Oil on canvas, lOx 12"
(25.4 x 30 .5 em ).
Henry E. Huntington library
and Art Callery, San Marino ,
California.

200 The Importance of Landscape-British Painting in the Early Nineteenth Century

8-23 John Constable, Flatford Mill from the Lock (conceptual sketch ), c.1811. Oil on canvas, 9 x II" (24.8 x 29.8 cm) Victoria and Albert
Museum , London.

criticized for their "spotty pencilling." This was a refer­ The Hay Wain was exhibited in Paris at the Salon of 1824,
ence to Constable's practice of painting with small dabs the French painter Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) was so
of pure color (often using a palette knife rather than a impressed with it that he repainted one of his own paint­
brush) instead of applying the paint smoothly and evenly. ings (shown at the same exhibition). Delacroix's art, in
Only a few critics realized that this technique allowed turn, became a model for the paintings of the Impres­
Constable to render light effects more effectively. In time, sionists and, even more, for the "pointillist" paintings of
Constable's technique would be quite influential. When Georges Seurat and his followers.

John Constable 201