Turner: The Late Seascapes (Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute) [Hardcover]

Curator James Hamilton (Author)

Book Description

Series: Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute | Publication Date: July 11, 2003

The English Romantic painter J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851) is renowned for his sublime and dramatic landscapes and seascapes. This volume, written by Turner expert James Hamilton and published in conjunction with a travelling exhibition organized by the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, focuses primarily on the artist's spectacular seascapes dating from the 1840s, the last decade of his illustrious career. The author provides insights into these powerful works, relating them to the artist's interest in poetry and drama as well as his curiosity about science, optics and photography. Turner's extensive travels and the relationship between Turner's paintings and 17th-century Dutch precedents are discussed in depth. Hamilton also examines the important role of the pendant in Turner's late art, arguing that his paired works have intentional associative narrative, stylistic and chromatic meanings. Furthermore, Hamilton traces the evolution of Turner's famous Whaling series, offering a new source for it. Including more than 100 examples of Turner's dramatic and lively marine pictures, 60 of which are reproduced in full colour, this title seeks to shed light on one of the world's most beloved artists.

Editorial Reviews

From The New Yorker

Showered with honors from the time he was in his teens, J. M. W. Turner had few setbacks in his long career as England's finest Romantic landscape painter. But the secret of his success, Hamilton suggests in this lively biography, had almost as much to do with an outsized gift for self-promotion as with artistic talent. From cocksure student to arrogant academician, Turner emerges as a greedy, status-obsessed egotist whose revolutionary treatment of light and color was offset by a good deal of bad poetry, not to mention bad manners. If the artist's self-avowed ambition was to surpass Claude Lorraine, he showed equal aptitude for dealing real estate, playing off patrons, and neglecting his family—his mentally disturbed mother died forgotten in an asylum. Still, for Hamilton no personal flaw can mar a world-class talent, and Turner escapes with his legacy intact, remaining, as he described himself, "the great lion of the day."
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker

Review

A beautiful and fascinating contribution. . . . Highly recommended. -- Choice

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 176 pages
• Publisher: Clark Art Institute (July 11, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300099002
• ISBN-13: 978-0300099003
• Product Dimensions: 11.5 x 9.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #979,970 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #58 in Books > Arts & Photography > Schools, Periods & Styles > Romantic

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

0 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars From Blackwell Publishing's The Art Book--Turner: The Late Seascapes, November 5, 2009

By 

Ann L. Bach "Ann L. E. Bach" (Connecticut, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Turner: The Late Seascapes (Paperback)

The Late Seascapes

James Hamilton


"As refreshing as the sea-breeze. . . . [Turner is] documented so

beautifully by Hamilton."--Ann L. E. Bach, The Art Book

2003 176 pp. 21 b/w + 70 color illus.

Cloth ISBN 09900-2 $39.95