Joseph Mallord William Turner, R.A.

John Dillon;
sale, London, Christie's, 29 April 1869, lot 139, bt. Agnew's;
with Agnew's, London;
Marquis de Santurce;
sale, London, Christie's, 16 June 1883, lot 124;
Sir John Fowler;
sale, London, Christie's, 6 May 1899, lot 36, bt. Agnew's;
with Agnew's, London;
Francis Stevenson;
E.G. Poole;
sale, London, Christie's, 1 October 1948, lot 20, bt. Agnew's;
with Agnew's, London;
Miss J. E. Stainer;
sale, London, Christie's, 5 March 1974, lot 189, bt. Leger;
with Leger Gallery, London;
with Richard Green Ltd., London;
by whom sold to Baron Guy and Myriam Ullens;
their sale, London, Sotheby's, 4 July 2007, lot 6;
where acquired by the present owner

Sir W. Armstrong, Turner, London 1902, p. 284;
W. Thornbury, The Life of J.M.W. Turner RA, 2^nd Edition, London 1877, p. 560;
A. Wilton, The Life and Work of J.M.W. Turner, Fribourg 1979, p. 432, no. 1116;
A.G.H. Bachrach, 'The Field of Waterloo and Beyond,' Turner Studies, Vol. I (2), Abingdon 1981, p. 8-9, no. 7;
C. Powell, Turner's Rivers of Europe: The Rhine, Meuse and Mosel, Manchester 1991, p. 25;
C. Powell, Turner in Germany, London 1995, p. 23
 

Engraved:

W. Miller, Scott's Prose Works, 1834-6, (R. 539)

 

This report has been prepared by: JANE McAUSLAND London office: Flat 3, 41 Lexington Street, Soho, London W1F 9AJ Fellow of the International Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works Accredited member of the Institute of Paper Conservation Jane McAusland Limited trading as Jane McAusland FIIC. Support: This small watercolour is executed on a sheet of wove paper laid onto another sheet. This operation has been done some time ago and could have been done by the artist. The condition is good Medium: The colours are very fresh and bright. The retouching in the sky on the left is probably the artist's. Note: This work was viewed outside studio conditions.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Please note that colour, clarity and weight of gemstones are statements of opinion only and not statements of fact by Sotheby's. We do not guarantee, and are not responsible for any certificate from a gemological laboratory that may accompany the property. We do not guarantee that watches are in working order. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue, in particular to the Notice regarding the treatment and condition of gemstones and to the Notice regarding import of Burmese jadeite and rubies into the US.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

In this exquisitely drawn landscape Turner presents the vast and undulating fields of Waterloo, the place where, two hundred years ago this year, Napoleon, Emperor of the French, was finally defeated. Lightning flashes and heavy rain soaks the terrain below. A flock of sheep peacefully graze the slopes, seemingly impervious to the raging storm, whilst two horsemen, at full gallop, head towards the shelter of the farm buildings of Hougoumont at the centre of the scene. In the near foreground lie the charred remains of the Picton tree, a sure indication that this is no ordinary pastoral landscape.

Turner visited Waterloo in August 1817, and completed an extensive investigation of the battlefields on horseback.¹ Relying upon Charles Campbell's recently published Guide through Belgium and Holland and also possibly with the assistance of a local guide, Turner's precise movements are well documented in both his Guards and Waterloo and Rhine sketchbooks.²

Annotating his sketches with the graphic calculations of the number of men killed at specific sites, Turner appears to have been not only fascinated but genuinely moved by what he observed. He was only seventeen when war with France was declared in 1793 and forty when it finally concluded in 1815 at the battle of Waterloo. Not surprisingly the site of this British victory had 'become a kind of Pilgrimage' for those like Turner, long confined to English shores.³

Drawn in 1833, eighteen years after the battle, and engraved for the frontispiece of Sir Walter Scott's 1835 publication, The Life of Napoleon (fig.1), Turner offers a view of the aftermath of the war-torn battlefields. 
  
This watercolour belies expectation and artistic tradition on every conceivable level. Battle paintings of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century by artists such as John Singleton Copley and Benjamin West represented the most valiant and heroic British actions. War was publicly proclaimed as a glorious national event and artists responded with historic battles being immortalised in scenes on the largest and most impressive scale possible. Any disillusionment Turner might have felt towards this traditional representation of historic battle scenes was also echoed in the anxiety expressed by Romantic authors who sensitively and emotionally mourned the toll of human life. Byron's hero in Canto III of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage published in 1816 does not glorify the British victory at Waterloo but instead laments 'this place of skulls, / The grave of France.'⁴ Following the Napoleonic wars, considerable shifts took place in the representation of battles and the military 'hero'.⁵ As this work demonstrates, emptiness, small scale and watercolour could ingeniously, with Turner's brush, become just as powerful as aesthetic ingredients for depictions of war. Poignant reflection upon an empty battlefield replaces exuberant glorification of battle.

Turner painted three other scenes of Waterloo; a watercolour of 1817, which is now in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, an oil on canvas dating from 1818, which is now in the Tate, Britain and a watercolour vignette of circa 1833, which was sold at Sotheby's New York in 2013.⁶
  
Only close observation of the intricate natural detail enables comprehension of the significance of this deceptively pastoral landscape, in which Turner relies upon the most powerful and sublime representation of nature, a lightning storm, to ensure an awe-inspiring impact on the viewer.   

1. See C. Campbell, The Travellers Complete Guide Through Belgium and Holland, 2^nd Edition, 1817
2. The 'Guards' Sketchbook (TB CLXIV) and the 'Waterloo and Rhine' Sketchbook (TB CLX)
3. C. Campbell, op. cit.
4. C. Powell, op. cit., 1991, p.20
5. J.W.M. Hichberger, Images of the Army; the Military in British Art, 1815-1914, 1988, pp. 1-7
6. This work was sold for $509,000 and remains in a private collection.