23 May – 14 September 2025
The Holburne Museum is delighted to present Impressions in Watercolour: Turner and his Contemporaries, a rare opportunity to see some of Turner’s finest watercolours, all of which are on loan from a private collection. Curated by Ian Warrell, the exhibition showcases Turner at his most experimental and gestural and places him among notable contemporaries, including Thomas Girtin and John Sell Cotman, highlighting the exciting developments in watercolour of the era in which they worked.
The collection of works on display at the Holburne encapsulates the transition towards the looser, plein-air sketching aesthetic of British watercolour artists in the 18th and 19th century. In this era, new directions, materials and techniques were being explored, building an impetus that validated watercolour as an expressive and serious medium. A wide range of works on paper, the majority of which were produced late in Turner’s career, reflect extensive travels across Europe, as well as within the UK.
The selection seeks to place examples of Turner’s idiosyncratic, experimental techniques in the wider context of distinctive innovations made by his peers, beginning with longtime collaborator, and sometime rival, Thomas Girtin, whose simple compositions and style were considered markedly bolder at the time. Just as notable, works by the slightly younger John Sell Cotman display a radically pared-back means of representation – building up his images by adopting strong planes of wash, and later fortifying his colours with a thickening paint. As well as showing Turner and his contemporaries at their most expressive and experimental, the exhibition emphasises the important role that an awareness of technique played during this exciting time in watercolour painting.
The possibilities for landscape painting as a genre were heavily in flux during this period, and its newly elevated status meant new exhibition venues were becoming available to painters of watercolour. The exhibition emphasises the experience of sketching directly from nature. New painting equipment permitted colouring on the spot, as can be seen in the works of David Cox and Peter DeWint. The exhibition will also include works by J.R. Cozens, Peter de Wint, John Crome and Henry Eldridge.
Turner presents a more complicated example, with a rich and ever-evolving practice taking him between the outdoors and the studio. Reflecting the extensive travel and immense productivity of Turner’s later years, placed in their proper historical context, the exhibition provides a refreshing look at his ever-evolving landscape-painting practise, through remarkable and rarely seen examples.
The Holburne will also publish a richly illustrated publication to accompany the exhibition, featuring essays by Ian Warrell and Timothy Wilcox.
Commenting on the exhibition, Chris Stephens, Director of the Holburne said: “We are delighted to participate in the nation-wide celebration of Turner’s 250th anniversary with this rare presentation of highlights from one of the greatest collections of English watercolours. Through some of the most beautiful examples of watercolour painting anywhere, we will see how these groundbreaking works provide the bridge between earlier landscape painting and the radical abstraction of the 20th century. Often through he most minimal of means we will feel as much as see the artists’ powerful and sensitive responses in front of the great expanses of the natural world.”
Image credit: J M W Turner, 'A Low Sun', c.1835-40, watercolour and bodycolour on buff paper. Private collection, photography © David Kirkham Fisheye Images