| Method | Steel engraving |
| Artist | Edward Goodall after J.M.W. Turner |
| Published | Published Jan.y 1, 1841 by James Ryman, High Street, Oxford |
| Dimensions | Image 317 x 465 mm |
| Notes |
An uncommon separately published view of the city. Edward Goodall's steel engraving is one of the most magnificent general views of Oxford accomplished after Turner. The sky is a brilliant medley of eddying clouds and arching rainbows. Such conditions enact a curious form of chiaroscuro on the cityscape below. Whilst the Radcliffe Camera and the spires of All Souls bathe in light, Tom Tower and Christ Church Cathedral are immersed in shadow. In the foreground, the work undergoes an almost bathetic shift from the sublime to the everyday. Although the showery sky is evinced in the hand of a student as he lowers an umbrella, the tone is no longer sublime, but agricultural. Across from the scholars, a farmer is hunched on horseback whilst a procession of women reap and gather crops. To the right, women and children look set for a picnic as they sit next to baskets and a bindle. A baby reaches for fruit as it rolls from the hamper. Edward Goodall (1795-1870) was a printmaker and draughtsman. Born in Leeds, Goodall was self-taught and owed his proficiency solely to his innate talent and perseverance. After exhibiting at the Royal Academy in 1822, Turner is said to have offered him a sequence of lucrative commissions. These include Dr Broadley's Poems, Samuel Rogers' Italy, Campbell's Poetical Works and the Picturesque Views of England and Wales. Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775 - 1851) was a painter and draughtsman who became one of the most celebrated artists Britain would ever produce. He was born near Covent Garden, London, and entered the Royal Academy Schools in December of 1789. The Academy, conscious of his prodigious talent, encouraged and supported Turner. He was elected as an Associate of the RA in 1799, and became a full Academician in 1802. His early oil painting flitted between Netherlandish works in the manner of Cuyp, Ruisdael and Van de Velde, classical landscapes like those of Claude and Richard Wilson, and, upon returning from his Parisian visit in 1802, grand historical compositions like those of Poussin and Titian. The development of his idiosyncratic style, commonly held to have been around 1803, led to critical condemnation. His preoccupation with light and colour produced abstract, near vorticistic works, which predated Impressionism, but were hugely controversial in the conformist context of late Georgian and early Victorian England. Whilst some critics accused Turner of extravagance and exaggeration, John Ruskin virulently thwarted these claims in Modern Painters, and championed the artist's fidelity to nature. Ruskin became the main advocate of a new generation of Turner admirers, usually professional, middle class, or newly wealthy, who embraced his work for its modernity. An enormously prolific artist, Turner bequeathed over three hundred oils and close to twenty thousand drawings and prints to the nation. His style produced many imitators, but no rivals. Rawlinson 651. Condition: Two vertical lines of staining to image. Repaired vertical tear to sky area. |
| Framing | mounted |
| Price | £725.00 |
| Stock ID | 52787 |