During the 1820s, Turner surveyed British scenery for reproduction in popular engravings. Designed first in watercolours, these aimed at a comprehensive view of the scenery, its history, industries and associations.

Turner's views of Shields, Newcastle and Gateshead, by night and day, were made for WB Cooke's Rivers of England and published in 1823. They were taken from the Tyne, at once the source of the man-made environment and transformed by it. At Shields, Turner contrasts natural and artificial light, as coal-heavers work all hours to load colliers with raw material of British industry - a scene both terrible and beautiful.