touching turner’s treasures (again)…

You may recall me singing the praises of the Ashmolean Museum’s brilliant Print Room in Oxford at various times in the past… I’ve previously viewed works by Michelangelo, Raphael and Turner there.

Well, I made another trip there yesterday to see some more of Turner’s watercolours. The museum is fortunate to have been bequeathed large quantities of artwork from John Ruskin in 1861. I was originally going to look at the handful of watercolour sketches Turner did of Oxford but, having chatted to the wonderfully enthusiastic and efficient Katherine (I’d met her on my previous visits in 2011 and 2012), I decided, instead, to look at some of the watercolours he did in France in 1830 – on the Loire, in Orleans, Tours, Blois and the like – a total of 22 watercolours in total.

I spent very nearly an hour poring over these amazing pieces of work. Each of them quite small – none bigger than say 15x20cm – apparently undertaken quite quickly and yet containing amazing amounts of detail (Turner’s ability to ‘imply’ detail through his technical mastery is simply breath-taking at times). I’ve merely dabbled in watercolours in the past (enjoyably, but pretty unsuccessfully!), but taking time to study these works by Turner left me completely in awe.

A huge privilege and another truly magical, memorable experience.

Photo: Just two of the watercolours I actually handled yesterday: Amboise (left) and ‘The Bridge and Chateau at Amboise’ (right).

PS: The Print Room at the Ashmolean is open to “members of the public, students and visiting scholars alike for the study and enjoyment of drawings and prints from the collection” (quote from the print room brochure)… and it’s free.
PPS: Turner’s output makes my ‘One Day Like This’ project (posting a daily drawing/photograph on my blog) positively puny in comparison (not that I could possibly compare myself to HIM!). Over the past 5 years or so, I’ve posted some 950 sketches. Turner left over 19,000 sketches and watercolours in the “Turner Bequest”, hundreds of finished watercolours and well over 500 oil paintings. How on earth did he find the time (he virtually produced a ‘sketch’ EVERY day of his adult life – and this doesn’t allow for his “finished” paintings!)? Blimey.