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Lot Essay
This is one of the forty subjects engraved after Turner's watercolours for Picturesque Views on the Southern Coast of England, published in parts between 1814 and 1826. The publishers were William Bernard Cooke and his brother George who between them did most of the engravings. The text was originally to have been written by John Landseer but he ultimately declined, whereupon Turner himself offered to provide a text in verse, making drafts in his 'Devonshire Coast No. 1' Sketchbook of 1811. On Turner's text being submitted by W.B. Cooke to the writer William Combe for editing it was rejected as being almost totally incomprehensible and inappropriate, requiring Combe himself to undertake the task. The project was originally intended to cover the whole of the English coast, but delays restricted the publication to the South Coast. (For the Southern Coast publication see Finberg, op. cit., 1927; Shanes, op. cit., 1981; and L. Herrmann, Turner Prints, The Engraved Works of J.M.W. Turner, Oxford, 1990, pp. 76-90).
Turner made two tours of the south-west of England in connection with the publication, in the summers of 1811 and 1813, completing the finished watercolours on his return to London. He was at Pendennis in 1811 and there are drawings in both his 'Ivy Bridge to Penzance' and 'Devonshire Coast No. 1' sketchbooks (now at Tate Britain; for both sketchbooks see A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London, 1909, I, pp. 356 and 352 respectively; both have more recently been catalogued by Matthew Imms on the Tate website).
The drawing which relates most closely to this view of Pendennis Castle is in the first of these, and is exceptional because in this instance Turner partly developed it in watercolour washes that anticipate and define the colour structure of the finished work (Turner Bequest CXXV 27; Tate, D08905). The sketchbook also contains a pencil view executed from further away (Turner Bequest CXXV 27 verso; Tate, D08906). On a smaller scale, the pocketbook known as the 'Devonshire Coast No. 1' sketchbook contains a pencil sketch from closer to the subject, which Eric Shanes has proposed was as significant as the partly coloured sketch in the evolution of the present watercolour (Turner Bequest, CXXIII 218; Tate, D08761).
Pendennis Castle, on the southern coast of Cornwall, lies on the west side of the Carrick Roads, faced to the east by St Mawes Castle. In the watercolour Turner placed a three-masted vessel, under full sail, about to pass between the headlands that encircle and protect the natural anchorage that is the Carrick Roads. The fainter, more distant headland is St Anthony Head, and just out of sight to the left (behind Pendennis Castle) lies St Mawes. Both fortresses were designed to protect the port of Falmouth inside the estuary. Like St. Mawes, Pendennis was built as part of Henry VIII's extensive coastal defense system and was completed in 1546. It suffered badly in the Civil War, holding out against the Cromwellian forces for five months until supplies ran out. Another of the Southern Coast watercolours depicts the view southwards from Falmouth, with Pendennis Castle on its promontory, as the chief defence of the port, while St Mawes can be seen far in the distance (Lady Lever Art Gallery, National Museums Liverpool, Wilton 455). But Turner was equally attracted by St Mawes as a subject in its own right and painted its great defensive tower and the local fishermen in an oil painting, exhibited at his own gallery in 1812, as well as in watercolours in the 1820s for both the Southern Coast and the Picturesque Views in England and Wales series (1812, Tate, Butlin & Joll no.123; c.1823, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Wilton 473; and c.1828, Sotheby’s, 4 July 2018, lot 206, Wilton 823). Given the proximity of Pendennis, it inevitably appears as a background feature in all of these images.
In the foreground here Turner depicted the wreckage of a sailing vessel being worked over by scavangers, some of whom have, rather perilously, ventured out onto a narrow strip of rock, which the churning sea threatens to reclaim at any moment. None of these elements are discernible in his preliminary sketch, where the presence of the exposed rock is barely registered. The activities of ‘wreckers’ such as these was controversial, as they would sometimes use lights to deliberately lure unwitting vessels onto dangerous rocky coasts. However, repurposing the flotsam and jetsam that washed up on the British coasts could be a lucrative trade.
As in many of the other Southern Coast watercolours, one of the most appealing features of the image is the subtle realization of the sky, with its variety of quick moving clouds, blowing in from the north-east. The blustery effect is enhanced by the pack of birds hovering over the foaming sea and spiralling up and across the face of the cliffs. The lively turbulence of the waters breaking against the rocky coast is vividly created through a mixture of marine-toned washes and lighter touches, but just as significantly through the rolling and churning lines Turner created from his reserved or reclaimed highlights, where the white of the underlying paper is integrated into the design.
All of these effects were given full expression in George Cooke’s masterly translation of the colour image into a black and white line engraving. The sky especially, with its more defined banks of heavy cumulus trundling towards the coast, complements and enriches Turner’s conception perfectly. The engraving eventually appeared in part VIII of the serial publication, published some time in 1817. However, although the publication line below the image claimed it was issued on 1 May, dated proofs were still being worked on in June and July. As was the norm, there was a marked discrepancy between the financial rewards for the original watercolour and the more painstaking labour of engraving the design. Accordingly Turner was paid only ten guineas for his design, while George Cooke received twenty-five guineas.
Benjamin Godfrey Windus (1790-1867), who owned the present watercolour by 1840, was one of the most important collectors of Turner's works during the artist's lifetime. He also had major collections of Stothard and Wilkie's works and in his later years was an important patron of the Pre-Raphaelites. A coachmaker by profession, he seems to have made his fortune by selling an opium-based confection for throat infections known as 'Godfrey's Cordial'. He added a library to his house at Tottenham Green for the display of most of his Turners; the library is shown in a watercolour of 1833 by John Scarlett Davis (London, British Museum; see Shanes, loc.cit., 1984, illustrated). Artists and connoisseurs are known to have visited the library from the late 1820s and it was opened to the public one day a week in the 1840s and 1850s; this was particularly helpful to Ruskin in his work on Modern Painters.
Windus lent watercolours by Turner to Cooke's Gallery as early as 1823 and 1824, including another work executed for the Southern Coast series in 1823. In 1840 William Robinson listed some seventy works as being in the library, as well as others in portfolios. In 1841 Windus bought his first two Turner oils, while continuing to acquire his watercolours up to 1845. However, much of his collection was sold by the time of his death, often by private treaty through David White. (For B.G. Windus see Shanes, op.cit., 1984; Whittington, op.cit., 1987; S. Whittington, 'Windus, Turner and Ruskin: New Documents', J.M.W. Turner, R.A., 1993, no. 2, pp. 69-116; T[erry] R[iggs], 'Windus, Benjamin Godfrey', E. Joll, M. Butlin and L. Herrmann, eds., The Oxford Companion to J.M.W. Turner, Oxford, 2001, pp. 386-7).
Turner made two tours of the south-west of England in connection with the publication, in the summers of 1811 and 1813, completing the finished watercolours on his return to London. He was at Pendennis in 1811 and there are drawings in both his 'Ivy Bridge to Penzance' and 'Devonshire Coast No. 1' sketchbooks (now at Tate Britain; for both sketchbooks see A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest, London, 1909, I, pp. 356 and 352 respectively; both have more recently been catalogued by Matthew Imms on the Tate website).
The drawing which relates most closely to this view of Pendennis Castle is in the first of these, and is exceptional because in this instance Turner partly developed it in watercolour washes that anticipate and define the colour structure of the finished work (Turner Bequest CXXV 27; Tate, D08905). The sketchbook also contains a pencil view executed from further away (Turner Bequest CXXV 27 verso; Tate, D08906). On a smaller scale, the pocketbook known as the 'Devonshire Coast No. 1' sketchbook contains a pencil sketch from closer to the subject, which Eric Shanes has proposed was as significant as the partly coloured sketch in the evolution of the present watercolour (Turner Bequest, CXXIII 218; Tate, D08761).
Pendennis Castle, on the southern coast of Cornwall, lies on the west side of the Carrick Roads, faced to the east by St Mawes Castle. In the watercolour Turner placed a three-masted vessel, under full sail, about to pass between the headlands that encircle and protect the natural anchorage that is the Carrick Roads. The fainter, more distant headland is St Anthony Head, and just out of sight to the left (behind Pendennis Castle) lies St Mawes. Both fortresses were designed to protect the port of Falmouth inside the estuary. Like St. Mawes, Pendennis was built as part of Henry VIII's extensive coastal defense system and was completed in 1546. It suffered badly in the Civil War, holding out against the Cromwellian forces for five months until supplies ran out. Another of the Southern Coast watercolours depicts the view southwards from Falmouth, with Pendennis Castle on its promontory, as the chief defence of the port, while St Mawes can be seen far in the distance (Lady Lever Art Gallery, National Museums Liverpool, Wilton 455). But Turner was equally attracted by St Mawes as a subject in its own right and painted its great defensive tower and the local fishermen in an oil painting, exhibited at his own gallery in 1812, as well as in watercolours in the 1820s for both the Southern Coast and the Picturesque Views in England and Wales series (1812, Tate, Butlin & Joll no.123; c.1823, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Wilton 473; and c.1828, Sotheby’s, 4 July 2018, lot 206, Wilton 823). Given the proximity of Pendennis, it inevitably appears as a background feature in all of these images.
In the foreground here Turner depicted the wreckage of a sailing vessel being worked over by scavangers, some of whom have, rather perilously, ventured out onto a narrow strip of rock, which the churning sea threatens to reclaim at any moment. None of these elements are discernible in his preliminary sketch, where the presence of the exposed rock is barely registered. The activities of ‘wreckers’ such as these was controversial, as they would sometimes use lights to deliberately lure unwitting vessels onto dangerous rocky coasts. However, repurposing the flotsam and jetsam that washed up on the British coasts could be a lucrative trade.
As in many of the other Southern Coast watercolours, one of the most appealing features of the image is the subtle realization of the sky, with its variety of quick moving clouds, blowing in from the north-east. The blustery effect is enhanced by the pack of birds hovering over the foaming sea and spiralling up and across the face of the cliffs. The lively turbulence of the waters breaking against the rocky coast is vividly created through a mixture of marine-toned washes and lighter touches, but just as significantly through the rolling and churning lines Turner created from his reserved or reclaimed highlights, where the white of the underlying paper is integrated into the design.
All of these effects were given full expression in George Cooke’s masterly translation of the colour image into a black and white line engraving. The sky especially, with its more defined banks of heavy cumulus trundling towards the coast, complements and enriches Turner’s conception perfectly. The engraving eventually appeared in part VIII of the serial publication, published some time in 1817. However, although the publication line below the image claimed it was issued on 1 May, dated proofs were still being worked on in June and July. As was the norm, there was a marked discrepancy between the financial rewards for the original watercolour and the more painstaking labour of engraving the design. Accordingly Turner was paid only ten guineas for his design, while George Cooke received twenty-five guineas.
Benjamin Godfrey Windus (1790-1867), who owned the present watercolour by 1840, was one of the most important collectors of Turner's works during the artist's lifetime. He also had major collections of Stothard and Wilkie's works and in his later years was an important patron of the Pre-Raphaelites. A coachmaker by profession, he seems to have made his fortune by selling an opium-based confection for throat infections known as 'Godfrey's Cordial'. He added a library to his house at Tottenham Green for the display of most of his Turners; the library is shown in a watercolour of 1833 by John Scarlett Davis (London, British Museum; see Shanes, loc.cit., 1984, illustrated). Artists and connoisseurs are known to have visited the library from the late 1820s and it was opened to the public one day a week in the 1840s and 1850s; this was particularly helpful to Ruskin in his work on Modern Painters.
Windus lent watercolours by Turner to Cooke's Gallery as early as 1823 and 1824, including another work executed for the Southern Coast series in 1823. In 1840 William Robinson listed some seventy works as being in the library, as well as others in portfolios. In 1841 Windus bought his first two Turner oils, while continuing to acquire his watercolours up to 1845. However, much of his collection was sold by the time of his death, often by private treaty through David White. (For B.G. Windus see Shanes, op.cit., 1984; Whittington, op.cit., 1987; S. Whittington, 'Windus, Turner and Ruskin: New Documents', J.M.W. Turner, R.A., 1993, no. 2, pp. 69-116; T[erry] R[iggs], 'Windus, Benjamin Godfrey', E. Joll, M. Butlin and L. Herrmann, eds., The Oxford Companion to J.M.W. Turner, Oxford, 2001, pp. 386-7).