He disliked steel engravings, or any plan to cheapen or popularize art.
He once told Sir Thomas Lawrence that he "didn't choose to be a basket
engraver." Being asked what he meant, he replied: "When I got off the
coach t'other day at Hastings, a woman came up with a basketful of your
'Mrs. Peel,' and wanted to sell me one for a sixpence."
The painter's hard-working life, with little comfort save what fame
brings to a man who eagerly seeks it, received its greatest shock in the
death of the aged father, in 1830. Turner said, "The loss was like that
of an only child." His friends the Trimmers said, "He never appeared the
same man after his father's death."
The plain barber had lived with his son for thirty years, and had seen
him gain wealth and renown. He could do little save to encourage with
his affection and be proud and grateful for the painter's success. And
this was enough. He was buried in St. Paul's, Covent Garden, the artist
writing this inscription for his monument:--
IN THE VAULT
BENEATH AND NEAR THIS PLACE
ARE DEPOSITED THE REMAINS OF
WILLIAM TURNER,
MANY YEARS AN INHABITANT OF THIS PARISH,
WHO DIED
SEPTEMBER 21ST, 1830.
TO HIS MEMORY AND OF HIS WIFE,
MARY ANN,
THEIR SON J. M. W. TURNER, R. A.,
HAS PLACED THIS TABLET,
AUGUST, 1832.
In 1832, Turner exhibited his memorable "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage;
Italy," in which he seemed to combine the mountains, the trees, the
cities, and the skies he had loved in that beautiful country. From 1833
to 1835 he produced his exquisite series, "The Rivers of France." Ruskin
says: "Of all foreign countries, Turner has most entirely entered into
the spirit of France; partly because here he found more fellowship of
scene with his own England; partly because an amount of thought which
will miss of Italy or Switzerland will fathom France; partly because
there is in the French foliage and forms of ground much that is
especially congenial with his own peculiar choice of form.... He still
remains the only, but in himself the sufficient, painter of French
landscape."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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