'A Tempest - Voyage of Columbus, for Rogers's 'Poems'', Joseph Mallord William Turner

Artwork details

Artist

Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775‑1851)

Title

A Tempest - Voyage of Columbus, for Rogers's 'Poems'

From Rogers's Poems 1835 Watercolours

Date c.1830-2

MediumGraphite and watercolour on paper

Dimensionssupport: 244 x 311 mm

Collection

Tate

Acquisition Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

Reference

D27719

Turner Bequest CCLXXX 202

View this artwork by appointment, at Tate Britain's Prints and Drawings Rooms

Catalogue entry

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851

A Tempest – Voyage of Columbus, for Rogers’s ‘Poems’ circa 1830–2

D27719
Turner Bequest CCLXXX 202

Pencil and watercolour, approximately 130 x 165 mm on white wove paper, 242 x 310 mm
Stamped in black ‘CCLXXX 202’ bottom right

Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856

Exhibition history

References

1903

E.T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn (eds.), Library Edition: The Works of John Ruskin: Volume I: Early Prose Writings 1834–1843, London 1903, pp.233, 244.

1904

E.T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn (eds.), Library Edition: The Works of John Ruskin: Volume XIII: Turner: The Harbours of England; Catalogues and Notes, London 1904, pp.380–1.

1906

E.T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn (eds.), Library Edition: The Works of John Ruskin: Volume XXI: The Ruskin Art Collection at Oxford, London 1906, p.214.

1909

A.J. Finberg, A Complete Inventory of the Drawings in the Turner Bequest, London 1909, vol.II, p.904, as ‘The Evil Spirit’.

1963

Edward Croft-Murray, Turner Watercolors from The British Museum: A Loan Exhibition Circulated by the Smithsonian Institution, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC 1963, p.20 no.53.

1972

Werner Haftmann, Andrew Wilton, Henning Bock and others, J.M.W. Turner: Gemälde Aquarelle, exhibition catalogue, Nationalgalerie Staatliche Museen Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, September–November 1972, pp.92 reproduced colour, 121 no.72.

1973

Norman Reid, Andrew Wilton and Luke Herrmann, Turner {1775 / 1851}: desenhos, aguarelas e óleos / Drawings, Watercolours and Oil Paintings, exhibition catalogue, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon 1973, pp.27, 108–9 no.40, reproduced.

1974

Martin Butlin, Andrew Wilton and John Gage, Turner 1775–1851, exhibition catalogue, Royal Academy, London 1974, p.99 no.283.

1975

Graham Reynolds, Turner 1775–1851: zhivopis', risunok, akvarel', exhibition catalogue, Hermitage Museum, Leningrad 1975, p.30 no.25.

1979

Andrew Wilton, The Life and Work of J.M.W. Turner, Fribourg 1979, p.444 no.1207.

1981

Dimitrios Papastamos, John Gage and Lindsay Stainton, J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851) / ¿¿.¿.G. ¿e¿¿e¿ (1775–1851), exhibition catalogue, National Pinakothiki, Athens 1981, pp.105 no.30, 116, reproduced (colour).

1983

Cecilia Powell, ‘Turner’s vignettes and the making of Rogers’ “Italy” ’, Turner Studies, vol.3, no.1, Summer 1983, p.10.

1984

Cecilia Powell, ‘Turner on Classic Ground: His Visits to Central and Southern Italy and Related Paintings and Drawings’, unpublished Ph.D thesis, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London 1984, p.291 note 93.

1987

John Gage, J.M.W. Turner: ‘A Wonderful Range of Mind’, New Haven and London 1987, p.204.

1999

Gerald Finley, Angel in the Sun: Turner’s Vision of History, Montreal and Kingston 1999, p.204.

1992

Maurice Davies, Turner as Professor: The Artist and Linear Perspective, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1992, pp.100, reproduced, 121 no.135, reproduced.

1992

Jan Piggott, ‘Turner’s “Columbus” Vignettes’, Turner Society News, no.61, August 1992, p.12.

1993

Jan Piggott, Turner’s Vignettes, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1993, pp.85 no.27 reproduced, 97, and reproduced colour on front cover.

This is one of seven illustrations that Turner produced for ‘The Voyage of Columbus’, a miniature epic poem which is the final work in the published volume of Rogers’s Poems (for a brief description of the poem, see Tate D27705; Turner Bequest CCLXXX 188). The seven vignettes in order of their appearance in Rogers’s text are: Tate D27705, D27706, D27714, D27707, D27708, D27719, D27709; Turner Bequest CCLXXX 188, 189, 197, 190, 191, 202, 192.

Like all of the ‘Columbus’ series, A Tempest was engraved by Edward Goodall.1 It appears as the tail-piece to Canto XII.2 The angel who guided Columbus’s ship across the ocean to America now tells him that he must return to Spain, although he will face a terrible tempest on his homeward journey:

Twice the Moon filled her silver urn with light.
Then from the Throne an Angel winged his flight;
...
“The wind recalls thee; its still voice obey.
Millions await thy coming; hence, away.
To thee blest tidings of great joy consigned,
Another Nature, and a new Mankind!...
Hence! tho’ assembling in the fields of air,
Now, in a night of clouds, thy Foes prepare
To rock the globe with elemental wars,
And dash the floods of ocean to the stars;
To bid the meek repine, the valiant weep,
And Thee restore thy Secret to the Deep!”
(Poems, pp.261–2)

Turner’s vignette shows the angel delivering his prophecy, whilst in the turbulent seas beneath Columbus’s ships are tossed by a violent storm. Surrounding the spirit in the sky are a number of armed spirits, an allusion to the angel’s prophecy that there will be war before there is peace in America.

Like another illustration, The Vision, which appears earlier in the ‘Columbus’ series (see Tate D27714; Turner Bequest CCLXXX 197), A Tempest is remarkable for combining imaginative design with dazzling light and colour effects. The imagery and content can be related to a number of other works by Turner. Anne Tennant has suggested that the series as a whole points toward Turner’s religious pictures of the 1840s,3 and Jan Piggott has observed that the angel seen here bears a strong resemblance to the figure of the spirit in the oil painting Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the Burning Fiery Furnace, exhibited 1832 (Tate N00517).4 John Gage, meanwhile, has highlighted the link between this vignette and The Angel Standing in the Sun, exhibited 1846 (Tate N00550),5 to which Turner appended the following couplet from Canto VI of Rogers’s ‘Voyage of Columbus’:6

The morning march that flashes to the sun;
The feast of vultures when the day is done

(Poems, p.242)

Turner made two preliminary pencil drawings related to this subject in the Berwick sketchbook of 1831 (see Tate D25694, D25695; Turner Bequest CCLXV 29a, 30). He also produced a preparatory colour study (see Tate D27617; Turner Bequest CCLXXX 100).

W.G. Rawlinson, The Engraved Work of J.M.W. Turner, R.A., vol.II, London 1913, no.403. There are two impressions in Tate’s collection (T04677 and T05130).

Samuel Rogers, Poems, London 1834, p.264.

Anne Tennant, unpublished MA report, Courtauld Institute, University of London 1978, p.28.

Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984, no.346; Piggott 1993, p.44.

Butlin and Joll 1984, no.425.

John Gage, J.M.W. Turner: ‘A Wonderful Range of Mind’, New Haven and London 1987, p.204.

Verso:

Inscribed by unknown hands in pencil ‘4’ top centre left and ‘31 | a’ centre right and ‘CCLXXX.202’ bottom centre
Stamped in black ‘CCLXXX 202’ lower centre

Meredith Gamer
August 2006

Read this catalogue entry in full

This catalogue entry is part of: David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, December 2012.