Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Forum, for Rogers’s ‘Italy’ c.1826–7. Tate.
This room presents a selection of Turner’s ‘vignettes’, small watercolours made as illustrations for books
Between 1830 and 1839 Turner made over 150 of these small scenes. The word ‘vignette’ comes from the term ‘little vine’, a reference to decorative vine-like designs in books. By the 19th century, ‘vignette’ had come to mean an illustration that had no border or hard edges.
Turner’s vignettes were mostly made for books written by leading poets of his day, including Lord Byron and Sir Walter Scott. Publishers were guaranteed good sales if Turner’s name was on the cover of the book. For Turner, it was an opportunity to boost his fame and relevance. The illustrated books enabled thousands of people to encounter Turner’s work without travelling to an exhibition to see his paintings.
A lover of literature who also wrote his own poetry, Turner clearly enjoyed the challenge of illustrating texts. Although they are small, the vignettes show Turner’s creative and technical skills in full. He conjures the same dramatic effects seen in his large-scale oil paintings: moonlight, sunrise, storms, the haze of snow. He gives us elaborate compositions, presenting vast, expansive spaces in miniature. Turner used a tiny brush made of a single squirrel hair to paint the fine details, requiring immense skill and control.
Highly skilled engravers had the job of transforming these intricate watercolours into monochrome prints. They used sharp tools to cut Turner’s design into a steel plate, then applied ink to the plate to print the image onto paper. Turner closely supervised their work, directing them to make changes so that their prints more closely matched his original vision.