Circa 1827-8
Oil on canvas

During 1827 Turner renewed his former close links with Lord Egremont, one of the most important collectors of his early oil paintings. That autumn he was among the guests at Petworth House, the aristocrat’s country home in Sussex, to the south of London. It was on this occasion Turner produced the remarkable series of gouache drawings that provide a rich evocation of the relaxed life of this exceptional house, and its extensive collections. Egremont was invariably hospitable to artists, offering generous support to those like William Blake and Benjamin Robert Haydon (1786-1846) who struggled to find patronage.

Turner’s stay at Petworth in 1827 also resulted in a commission for a set of four landscapes. These were conceived to be part of the refurbishment of one of the grand public rooms, which was already finely ornamented with Grinling Gibbons’ intricate limewood carvings. Instead of submitting finished pictures, an intermediate stage occurred, during which Turner’s full-scale, preparatory studies were installed in the spaces below the family portraits, possibly remaining there for some months, and that this process allowed Egremont to decide on the subjects he wanted Turner to pursue.  Though only four views were required, Turner in fact developed six compositions.  Those eventually chosen are united by the conjunction of a sunset scene with a setting associated with the earl himself: two offer views of the adjacent park (designed by ‘Capability’ Brown), featuring details that allude to the contemporary management of the estate; another focuses on the Chain Pier at Brighton, an initiative in which Egremont had led the subscribers; and the last was a view of Chichester Canal, though this waterway had not fulfilled the hopes of its developers.

No.59 is the most personal of the studies, showing the figure of Lord Egremont either striding out towards the sunset, or returning to the house as his pack of dogs rush out to greet him. Turner dropped this affectionate incidental portrait from the finished version, creating instead a different kind of portrait statement in which the earl’s agricultural and sporting interests are documented in the same parkland. No.60 is the preliminary version of the painting of the lake in Petworth Park that since 2002 hangs once more in the Carved Room. This study reveals how Turner’s use of oils gained from the experimental work he was undertaking in watercolours during the 1820s. The canvas is primed with a white ground, approximating to a paper support, on top of which Turner has merely laid down broad areas of colour to denote the forms he seeks to represent. The effect is similar to that found in many of the ‘colour beginnings’ from this period. Apart from the splayed radiance of a transcendent sunset, very little is delineated specifically.  By contrast, the work Egremont eventually acquired is alive with inflected brushwork, as well as an animated foreground filled with stags and swans.

The unfinished study of the beached ship (no.61) seems to have originated as a companion to the view of Brighton Chain Pier, and can be seen installed in the Carved Room in a watercolour of about 1828. Though the reasons for its inclusion in the Petworth sequence remain uncertain, it now seems possible to identify the long jetty depicted on the left as that at Yarmouth, on the north-east coast of England.