Shorthand

TURNER'S OXFORD

Ashmolean Raises Money to Acquire
Major Painting by JMW Turner

Today the Ashmolean Museum announces that it has raised the money needed to acquire a major painting by Joseph Mallord William Turner. Following the launch, in June, of a public appeal, the Museum has received an extraordinary response from members of the public donating money towards the acquisition of Turner's painting of 1810, The High Street, Oxford. Local people and museum visitors have sent in over £60,000, helping the Ashmolean reach the fundraising target in just four weeks.

Xa Sturgis, Director
Ashmolean Museum

The painting, which has been on loan to the Museum from a private collection since 1997, has been offered to the nation in lieu of inheritance tax. The High Street, Oxford would settle £3.5 million of inheritance tax – which is more than the tax liable on the estate – so the Museum needed to raise the difference, £860,000, to acquire it. In addition to the £60,000 donated by the public, the Ashmolean received lead support from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) with a grant of £550,000; a grant of £220,000 from the Art Fund; and a further £30,000 from the Friends and Patrons of the Ashmolean. Now that the funds have been raised, and following the completion of the transfer of the painting to the nation, it will be permanently allocated to the Ashmolean Museum through the Acceptance in Lieu Scheme.

The High Street, Oxford is unique in Turner's output and in the history of English art. It represents one of the most beautiful streets in Europe, a street which has materially changed little since Turner painted it. Although he painted many townscapes in watercolour, Turner never again attempted such a picture in oils.

High Street, Oxford, 2015 (c) David Fisher, 2015

Acknowledged as one of the greatest landscape artists of all time, JMW Turner (1775-1851) painted over thirty finished watercolours of Oxford views, by far the most numerous group devoted to a single place in his entire output. He was familiar with the architecture of the city, having visited relations in the village of Sunningwell (five miles southwest of Oxford) during his childhood. In 1799, he received his most prestigious commission to date, to provide two designs for the University's annual calendar, the Oxford Almanack.

The success of these two watercolours led to commissions for a further eight, published between 1799 and 1810. They show a deliberately wide variety of street scenes, colleges and interiors. It was, no doubt, the quality of these pictures that led Oxford printseller, James Wyatt, to commission the view of the High Street.

South View of Christ Church, &c. from the Meadows | 1794-5 | Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford

High Street, Oxford is the only English townscape of the nineteenth century that can bear comparison with Canaletto's views of London of the 1750s. The subject had become popular for printsellers in the 1750s, but Turner’s painting, and the related print, completely eclipse the views by all other artists. Turner’s training as an architectural draughtsman enabled him to depict with great accuracy the varied buildings lining the street, from the medieval tower of St Martin’s Church at Carfax, the Baroque portico of St Mary’s, to the elegant classical spire of All Saints.

Colin Harrison
Senior Curator, Ashmolean

Turner has deliberately insisted on the combination of Town and Gown in the painting, for, although his patron was a prominent member of the Town, he had many friends in the University.

The painting was completed in March 1810, and was exhibited in Wyatt's shop at 115 High Street, before being shown in Turner's own gallery in his house in Queen Ann Street. Wyatt was evidently delighted, and commissioned a pendant View of Oxford from the Abingdon Road (private collection). Both were exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1812.

When, in the 1830s, Turner was choosing views of Oxford for his greatest series of watercolours, he rejected the High Street. He felt that, in the painting of 1810, he had achieved an unparalleled view of technical mastery that he could not repeat.

Turner worked on the painting during the winter of 1809-10. The final stage involved the introduction of figures and some women 'for the sake of colour’. The group on the left, bending over a basket of spilt oranges, serves this function.

Over the summer, the painting will remain on display in the Museum's welcome space, and twelve full-size reproductions will be installed in prominent locations around the city to inspire the public to come and see the painting at the Museum and to take part in the 'My Oxford View’ Photography Competition.

Photographers of all ages and abilities are invited to send in their personal view of Oxford, captured on a camera or smartphone. The winning entries from each of three age groups will be displayed in the Museum’s Café in September.

The painting will be lent to regional museums in the surrounding area and it will also be at the heart of a new series of educational activities for schools and young people, much like the 'Inspired by Manet' campaign launched in 2012 (described in further detail by Helen Ward, Deputy Head of Education, in the video below).