The painter of light

Turner is perhaps the best-loved English Romantic artist. He became known as 'the painter of light', because of his increasing interest in brilliant colours as the main constituent in his landscapes and seascapes. His works include water colours, oils and engravings.

Since the 19th century Turner's painting became increasingly abstract as he strove to portray light, space, and the elemental forces of nature. Characteristic of his later period are such paintings as The Fighting Té mé raire and Rain, Steam, and Speed (both: National Gall., London). His late Venetian works, which describe atmospheric effects with brighter colors, include The Grand Canal (Metropolitan Mus.) and Approach to Venice (National Gall., Washington, D.C.). Turner encountered violent criticism as his style became increasingly free, but he was passionately defended by Sir Thomas Lawrence and the youthful Ruskin. Visionary, revolutionary, and extremely influential, these late paintings laid the groundwork for impressionism, postimpressionism, abstract expressionism, color-field painting, and a myriad of other art movements of the late 19th and 20th cents.

2.Legacy.

Turner's will, which was under litigation for many years, left more than 19, 000 watercolors, drawings, and oils to the British nation. Most of these works are in the National Gallery and the Tate Gallery, London. Many of Turner's oils have deteriorated badly.

Turner bequeathed much of his work to the nation. The great majority of the paintings are now at Tate Britain.

But many works are in private collections.

An article in the newspaper " Izvestia" for October 2011:

" Watercolor Turner will go under the hammer!

The first time in 127 years at a London auction will exhibit the work of the great English painter.Turner's painting " Villa Pope in Twickenham" at Sotheby's.

Joseph Turner watercolor, depicting the picturesque views of the river Lune, put up for auction at Bonham's next January. The work of the great Englishman will be sold for the first time for 127 years - in 1884 she was in a private collection and was not present at the auction. The last time the public saw the figure in 2000, at the " Great watercolor" at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Not surprisingly, the information about the sale of Turner watercolors caused a stir in art circles…

…Originally Turner watercolor with River Lune was to become one of the 85 works included in the book on the species of northern England. However, the high cost of the project has forced publishers to abandon it. They say, Turner asked for the design of the book three thousand guineas - a fabulous sum in those days. Ie for every watercolor artist claimed 35 gold coins. In 1884, the work was sold for 820 guineas, and now Bonham's auction house estimated it at 300 thousand pounds... "