Turner, Joseph Mallord William

English painter. He was one of the most original artists of his day. He travelled widely in Europe, and his landscapes became increasingly Romantic, with the subject often transformed in scale and flooded with brilliant, hazy light. His innovative use of emotive colour, as in The Slave Ship (1840; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts); and his passionate depiction of feeling as it exists in the natural environment, had a tremendous influence on modern art. Many later works anticipate Impressionism, for example Rain, Steam and Speed (1844; National Gallery, London).

A precocious talent, Turner entered the Royal Academy schools in 1789. In 1792 he made the first of several European tours from which numerous watercolour sketches survive. His early oil paintings show Dutch influence (such as that of van de Velde), but by the 1800s he had begun to paint landscapes in the ‘Grand Manner’, reflecting the Italianate influences of Claude Lorrain and Richard Wilson.

Many of his most dramatic works are set in Europe or at sea, for example, Shipwreck (1805), Snowstorm: Hannibal Crossing the Alps (1812), and Destruction of Sodom (1805), all at the Tate Gallery, London; and The Slave Ship. Turner was also devoted to literary themes and mythologies, such as Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus (1829; Tate Gallery, London).

His use of colour was enhanced by trips to Italy (1919, 1828, 1835, and 1840), and his brushwork became increasingly free, allowing him to capture both the subtlest effects of light and atmosphere and also the most violent forces of nature. Although encouraged by the portraitist Thomas Lawrence and others early in his career, he failed to achieve recognition, and it was not until he was championed by the critic John Ruskin in Modern Painters (1843) that his originality was fully appreciated.

In his old age he lived as a recluse in Chelsea, London, under an assumed name. He died there, leaving to the nation more than 300 paintings, nearly 20,000 watercolours, and over 19,000 drawings. In 1987 the Clore Gallery extension to the Tate Gallery, London, was opened to display his bequest.