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Piece of Art Showing People Looking at the Water Early 1800s

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Constable and Turner: British Landscapes of the Early 1800s

As if standing on a grassy riverbank, we look across the placid surface of a river that is lined along the opposite bank with trees and farm animals in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is painted loosely with brushstrokes visible throughout, so some details are difficult to make out. For the surface of the river, russet brown and steel gray paint skims lightly across the canvas and leaves some unpainted areas visible, creating the effect of light shimmering on the still water. A palette of muted greens and browns conveys the calm country scene below a light and cloud-filled sky. On our left, a shallow wooden barge propelled along the stream by two men in red caps with long poles, carries a white horse wearing blinkers and a harness along the stream in front of us. The riverbank behind them is lined with pale, sage-green grass tinged with gold, growing in front of a tangle of darker green trees and bushes. Across the water from us near the middle of the picture, a small rowboat sits in the shallows at the foot of a steep riverbank. Above, a white cottage with a reddish roof and chimney is tucked behind the trees, with a wooden rack full of honey colored hay next to it. Nearby, a plow and wheeled cart, highlighted with strokes of white, sit near more mounds of hay painted with dashes of chocolate brown and dusty tan. Rocky fields reach into the distance. The vista is blocked to our right by another clump of trees and a rocky outcropping, rising from the stream, to our right of center. The steep, dark roof of a farmhouse is barely visible among the trees. Along the riverside to our right, a small group of cinnamon brown and cream-colored cows stand at water's edge. A rolling pasture stretches behind them to meet blue hills in the distance. Above, in the upper third of the painting, mottled white, pale rose, and gray clouds rolling across a steel-gray sky are reflected in the water below.

Overview

The landscape painters Turner and Constable were influential exponents of romanticism, an artistic movement of the late 1700s to mid-1800s that emphasized an emotional response to nature. Turner, who traveled extensively, oftentimes infused his dramatic seascapes and landscapes with literary or historical allusions. Constable, who never left England, preferred more straight forward depictions of placid rural scenery.

Working in the studio from sketches and his imagination, Turner blended his oil paints in fluid layers of translucent color, called glazes. Constable, sometimes painting straight outdoors, applied flickering touches of thick, opaque oils. Despite their differences in temperament and technique, Turner and Lawman evoke the aforementioned worship of nature that imbues the literature of their contemporaries, the romantic poets Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Shelley, and Keats.

John Constable, British, 1776 - 1837, The White Horse, 1818-1819, oil on sail, Widener Collection, 1942.9.9

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We look out onto a landscape with low, grassy hills to the left, a lake to the right, and a brick building in the center distance below a sky filled with towering white clouds. The horizon line bisects the horizontal canvas. A wooden fence in the foreground crosses the landscape from the lower left corner and disappears where the land slopes down to meet the water at the center of the painting. Several black and white cows graze in the field beyond the fence to our left. Two men in a wooden boat pull in nets on the lake to our right near a pair of swans. The lake crosses the composition in the middle ground, disappearing into a culvert in the distance. A donkey pulls a small carriage with two people near a bridge that crosses the lake in the middle distance to our left. The large brick house is visible through a break in the full, deep green trees that line the horizon. The clouds cast noticeable shadows in the brightly sunlit scene.

This movie, exhibited at Great britain's Royal Academy in 1817, demonstrates Constable'southward wish to be "a natural painter" because information technology was created nearly entirely out-of-doors. During August and September 1816, the creative person documented this country estate of erstwhile family unit friends and recorded his progress in messages to his fiancée. (The commission financed their wedding ceremony.)

Centered in the panoramic design, the red brick manor house stands out past reason of its warm color in an otherwise cool scheme of blues, greens, and grays. Constable wrote about the "cracking difficulty" of incorporating the thatch-roofed deer barn. To add this requested motif, he cleverly sewed about an inch of extra fabric to the canvass at the far right. And so, in club to restore the composition's symmetrical residuum, he stitched a like strip to the left side, where he showed the owners' girl, Mary Rebow, driving a donkey cart.

John Constable, British, 1776 - 1837, Wivenhoe Park, Essex, 1816, oil on canvas, Widener Drove, 1942.9.10

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Constable frequently depicted Salisbury's famous spire, which, at 404 feet, is the tallest in England. Piercing the air, the lofty steeple attracts attending to the temper around information technology. One of Lawman's primary interests was portraying the weather—a procedure he called "skying."

When the Gothic cathedral was finished in the 1300s, its grounds were walled or enclosed; this Close forms a lush, marshy park. The couple strolling through the Shut's artery of elms may be John Fisher, the Archbishop of Salisbury, and his married woman. Their nephew, an archdeacon and art patron, was Constable'south closest friend. This personal gift, kept past the creative person, freshly observes the sunshine dappling the lawn. With long shadows falling from the westward, the time is early evening. The canvas was executed spontaneously on the spot, and its brown underpainted layer is nevertheless visible beneath the copse.

John Constable, British, 1776 - 1837, Salisbury Cathedral from Lower Marsh Close, 1820, oil on canvas, Andrew West. Mellon Collection, 1937.1.108

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We look across churning waves at four sailing ships and a wooden rowboat with four men aboard in this horizontal painting. Dark, iron grey and tawny brown clouds approaching from the right fill the top two-thirds of the composition. The water closest to us roils with steel gray, tan, and chocolate brown that deepens to charcoal gray as it recedes towards low hills in the distant background. In the lower left corner of the painting, a chestnut-brown container bobs in the water and a white bird flies low over the water nearby. Two ships to the left of center head directly towards us, leaning steeply to our left with their beige sails taut with wind. Two men, tiny in scale, stand on the deck of the ship closest to us. To our right, two ships with butter yellow and peach sails cut through the water. Three men stand on the deck of the ship closer to us, pulling on the rigging. Closest to us and to the right of center, the rowboat crests a wave, tilting forward so we see the interior and the four men there. The stern is angled to our left so we look into the long side of the rowboat. Near the stern, one man hangs over the side while another holds onto him. Two men sit to the right, one facing us while the other faces away. Sunlight streaks down through a break in the storm clouds to fall on a ship with furled sails in the distance at the center of the composition. This and two additional ships near the distant shoreline are silhouetted against white clouds with steel gray bottoms that float across a blue sky.

Turner, who earned an early reputation for producing accurate topographical views, opened his own private sales gallery, where he exhibited this turbulent seascape. Based on notes in the artist's sketchbooks, the scene is the wide mouth of the Thames joining the North Bounding main, where the smaller River Medway further churns the waves. To the due south, the town on the far shore is the seaport of Sheerness.

To heighten the tempest's affect, Turner artfully manipulated the lighting in this composition. The sails at the correct, for instance, are brilliantly silhouetted against the dark clouds. In actuality, nonetheless, the sun is obscured high in the sky behind the thunderheads, making information technology impossible for sunbeams to strike those ships from the side.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, The Junction of the Thames and the Medway, 1807, oil on canvas, Widener Collection, 1942.9.87

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Painted in golden tones of butter and harvest yellow, tawny brown, and olive green, this horizontal landscape painting has a low wall stretching diagonally from the lower right corner off to our left, dividing a river to our right from a grassy lawn to our left. The waist-high wall is lined with tall trees with high canopies, which fill most of the composition. Close to us, at the lower center of the painting, a hoop rests against the end of a second, low wall. A short ladder with four rungs leans against a tree trunk in the lower left corner. Only a sliver of the ivy-covered trunk rises along the left edge of the painting. A short distance away, two chairs near a small, square-topped wooden table sit on the grass under the long shadows of the tall trees. Two or three people, seeming to wear long skirts, stand or sit on the long wall that spans the width of the painting, behind a nearby tree trunk. A navy-blue garment lays over the wall to our right and a black dog walks balances on the wall near the center of the painting, beyond the people. Barely visible, a small white dog stands with its front paws on the wall next to the black dog. A pathway alongside the trees and wall leads to a covered structure with a triangular pediment roof held up by fluted columns in the distance. Several long, low barges filled with people float in the river to our right. Red and white flags flutter in the breeze and the full, rectangular sails of a couple of the boats are raised. The placid surface of the river is thickly painted, especially where the small disk of the pale yellow sun reflects on the golden surface of the water below. The horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition and is lined in the deep distance with a band of loosely painted, muted, mauve-colored buildings and trees.

A stylish London suburb, Mortlake Terrace lies next to the Majestic Botanical Gardens at Kew, visible here on the afar bend of the River Thames. This is ane of a pair of views commissioned by the possessor of a town house, The Limes, named after the magnificent lime trees lining its terrace. Both scenes daringly portray the blazing deejay of the sun itself, which here flashes a reflection from the rock parapet.

The companion piece, at present in New York City'south Frick Collection, depicts the firm at sunrise. Reversing the view, this picture looks due west over the garden at sunset after the children take abased their toys. A blackness dog barks at the Lord Mayor's flag-decked barge. This dark accent, which enhances the summer evening's hazy paleness, was a last-infinitesimal addition. Only earlier the Majestic Academy evidence opened in 1827, Turner cut the canis familiaris out of paper, stuck information technology onto the wet varnish, and touched information technology up with highlights and a neckband.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, Mortlake Terrace, 1827, oil on canvass, Andrew West. Mellon Collection, 1937.1.109

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This seascape was exhibited in 1833 at the Royal Academy, where Turner taught every bit the professor of perspective. Conquering the problem of creating a believable sense of space across a featureless area of water, Turner anchored the carefully aligned design upon a small passenger ferry. From this foreground focus, a row of larger ships moves backward over the inclement waves on a diagonal line, generating a remarkable illusion of depth. The warship'due south Dutch flags and the skyline of Rotterdam pay tribute to Turner's predecessors, the marine painters of seventeenth-century Kingdom of the netherlands. In detail, the low horizon and deject-swept vista derive from harbor scenes by Jan van Goyen and Aelbert Cuyp.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, Rotterdam Ferry-Boat, 1833, oil on canvas, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Collection, 1970.17.135

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We seem to stand on or over the water looking across a glittering canal lined with long, low boats and sailboats at an ivory colored church in the distance to our right in this horizontal landscape painting. The horizon line comes about a third of the way up the composition and wispy white clouds sweep across the brilliant azure blue sky above. A row of buildings comes into view lining the canal to our right, with a terracotta colored building followed by a creamy white building beyond, both angled towards the church. The church has a high dome rising beyond the temple-like front with columns and a triangular pediment. A tall bell tower rises to the left of the church. The low boats, gondolas, to our left are packed with people while a few gondolas floating in the center of the canal appear occupied only by their gondoliers standing and holding their poles. Painted in tones of ivory and apricot, the sails of boats behind the gondolas to our left billow in the breeze while the sails of vessels docked to our right are furled. The structures, boats, and people cast shimmering reflections on the glass-like water of the canal. Rows of boats and buildings lining the canal extend seemingly indefinitely into the deep distance to our left.

At the "especial proposition" of a British textile manufacturer, Turner devised this Venetian cityscape equally a symbolic salute to commerce. Gondolas behave cargoes of fine fabrics and exotic spices. On the right is the Dogana, or Community Firm, topped past a statue of Fortune, which Turner profoundly enlarged in size. Moreover, the Church of San Giorgio Maggiore has been pushed very far back in space, making the Grand Canal seem much wider than information technology really is.

These theatrical exaggerations and the precise, linear drafting of the compages owe much to Canaletto, an eighteenth-century Venetian painter whose art glorified his metropolis. At the 1834 Purple Academy show, critics gave enraptured praise to the scene's radiant, sparkling waters. The next yr, another commission from the same patron resulted in its moonlit companion piece, Keelmen Heaving in Coals past Moonlight.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, Venice: The Dogana and San Giorgio Maggiore, 1834, oil on sail, Widener Drove, 1942.9.85

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We seem to hover over a flaxen-colored, yellow-gray body of water lined with ships to our left and right, which are silhouetted against a moonlit, cloud-veiled sky, which fills the top two-thirds of this horizontal landscape painting. The moon hangs to our left of center in the sky, its light reflecting on the clouds in a bright, hourglass shape to create a tunnel-like effect. The sea below turns from a golden, gray color close to us to pale blue along the horizon. To our left, one ship with gray sails is cut off by the edge of the canvas and another, also with gray sails, is situated farther away from us. A small, dark rowboat with two passengers moves between them. Light from the windows in buildings along the distant horizon to our left reflect in the water, and another building, a factory, spouts white flame from its chimney. More dark ships line the waterway to our right, their spiky masts black against the sky. Three flames, one orange between two pale yellow fires, flare in the darkness in front of the ship closest to us. The forms of men shoveling coal, crates, and barges are dark silhouettes against the firelight and smoke. More rowboats float among the boats in the distance. Near the lower right corner of the canvas, a broad, flat fragment of wood, perhaps a piece of a wreckage, floats close to us. The hot orange and black on the right side of the painting contrasts with the silvery grey, light blue, and white that fills much of the rest of the composition. The painting was created with thick, blended brushstrokes throughout, giving the scene a hazy look. The texture of some of the brushstrokes is especially noticeable, as where the moon casts white light onto the water and in the clouds. The artist signed a buoy floating to our left with his initials,

On England's River Tyne, near the mining city of Newcastle, stevedores called keelmen transfer coal from barges, or keels, to oceangoing vessels. The harsh glare of the workmen's torches contrasts with the funnel of creamy light emanating from the moon. Critical opinion nearly Turner'southward unusual nocturne was divided. One reviewer observed: "It represents neither night nor day, and yet the general effect is very amusing and surprising.'

Commissioned every bit a pendant to Venice: The Dogana and San Giorgio Maggiore and shown at the Royal Academy in 1835, this sail creates a total counterpoint in mood and meaning. The Venetian scene is far away in the Mediterranean Sea, concerns luxury goods, and glows with warm daylight. This North Sea view—a familiar sight to the British public—reveals sooty, modern industry chilled by the colors of a winter's night.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, Keelmen Heaving in Coals by Moonlight, 1835, oil on canvas, Widener Collection, 1942.nine.86

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In classical mythology, Pluto, the god of the underworld, abducted the maiden Proserpine to make her his wife and the queen of Hades. Turner, in this entry from the 1839 Majestic Academy exhibition, depicted the moment when Pluto's peppery chariot erupts earthward, burning the meadow and terrifying Proserpine's attendants. The setting, as dramatic, is a fantasy based upon the hills, gorges, waterfalls, and ruins at Tivoli, an ancient hamlet about Rome.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, The Rape of Proserpine, 1839, oil on sheet, Souvenir of Mrs. Watson B. Dickerman, 1951.eighteen.1

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Through a golden haze and across an expanse of gently rippling water dotted with boats, ghostly ivory and parchment-white buildings rise along a distant shore in this loosely painted horizontal landscape. The misty horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition, and the sky above is mostly butter yellow with a few touches of shell pink, and a patch of topaz blue in the upper left corner. Closest to us, in the lower right corner, several honey-yellow boats are pulled up to a cream-white dock. Touches of charcoal gray, peacock green, ruby red, and mauve pink suggest cloth or other objects filling the boats and piled on the corner of the dock. A few strokes of white, blush pink, and brick red suggest several people beyond a low wall or other structure to our right. Farther back and to our left, streaks and swipes of coral red, pale yellow, and gold suggest boats along a dock. Along the horizon, in the distance opposite us, there is a golden-yellow building with a tower on its front façade. Beyond this building, a cream-white structure with two tall domes rises against the sky. Along the horizon to either side, blended smudges of lilac-purple, rose pink, and aquamarine blue suggest more buildings and boats. The buildings and boats are reflected in the loosely painted straw-yellow water. The artist signed the painting as if he had written his initials on the wall near the lower right corner,

Displayed at the Royal Academy in 1843, Turner'due south late view of Venice shows the Community House, or Dogana, from an angle opposite to that seen in his 1834 movie. Behind the Dogana, the domes of the Church of Santa Maria della Salute rise confronting the vibrantly luminous sky. Although his early on works had made Turner wealthy and famous, this later on style—in which lite evaporates the solid forms—was far as well avant-garde for his contemporaries to comprehend. In retrospect, nonetheless, information technology is such belatedly works that had the most affect upon subsequent landscapists. (The parapet at the bottom right is formally inscribed with Turner'south total initials, JMWT; informally, friends called him Bill.)

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, The Dogana and Santa Maria della Salute, Venice, 1843, oil on sail, Given in retentiveness of Governor Alvan T. Fuller by The Fuller Foundation, Inc., 1961.2.3

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A butter-yellow sky fills the top two-thirds of this square landscape painting while in the bottom third, a brown structure is surrounded by golden yellow and pine-green forms like clouds. The scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes, so much of the detail is indistinct and the view seems hazy. Clouds spiral around the sun or moon, painted as a pale yellow disk, hanging in the center of the sky. The golden yellow clouds near the center darken to slate gray then rust brown, and nearly wine-red along the top edge. A flock of birds painted as a dense band of navy and denim blue Vs curve around the sun and continue into the deep distance. Below, touches of burgundy red and brown could indicate people or animals around the arched, copper-brown structure. Cloud-like puffs in forest green and golden yellow could suggest a forest or wildly crashing waves. A few faint outlines in this area suggest a bear, crocodile, giraffe, and maybe other ghostly creatures.

While Noah and his wife sleep in their tent, the biblical Flood begins. In a spiraling vortex of pelting and moonlight, birds and beasts head toward the distant Ark. This is a preliminary version of a sail shown in the 1843 Purple Academy. Now in London's Tate Gallery, the terminal work uses stronger color contrasts but is equally evocative and sketchy.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, The Evening of the Deluge, c. 1843, oil on canvas, Timken Collection, 1960.6.forty

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Butter yellow clouds and water, a periwinkle sky, and pale plum-colored buildings blend in hazy, indistinct bands across this horizontal landscape painting. The blurry horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition and the small, round, white sun shines low in the sky to our left. The sky or clouds around the sun are painted with shades of pale sapphire-blue with touches of lavender, which give way to a lemon-yellow clouds or haze in the right two-thirds of the sky. Buildings along the horizon, deep in the distance across the right three-quarters of the canvas, are loosely painted with vertical swipes of heather-pink and cream-white. The water, closest to us, reflects the yellow of the sky with additional touches of celery green. Brown boats spaced along the harbor carry people and objects away from us, towards the town. The paint is thickly applied in some areas, especially along the top of the sky, and the scene is loosely painted with visible brushstrokes throughout.

As barges and gondolas slowly cross the Venetian lagoon, the misty city vanishes in the twilight. John Ruskin, the major art critic who was one of Turner's few champions later in his career, hailed the canvas equally "the nearly perfectly beautiful piece of colour of all that I have seen produced by man easily." In the Majestic Academy catalogue for 1844, this entry was accompanied by a quotation that Turner himself rewrote from Lord Byron's poem Childe Harold:

"The moon is up, and however it is non night,
The sun every bit yet disputes the day with her."

Joseph Mallord William Turner, British, 1775 - 1851, Approach to Venice, 1844, oil on canvas, Andrew W. Mellon Drove, 1937.1.110

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Source: https://www.nga.gov/features/slideshows/constable-and-turner-british-landscapes-of-the-early-1800s.html

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