3-011-350 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

"Norham Castle", from the photographed edition of the "Liber Studiorum", by J. M. W. Turner, 1864. '...a photograph from any work of art...in which variety of colour is a prominent characteristic must be full of relative untruthfulness and can scarcely be other than inharmonious. Hence, photographs from the oil pictures and water-colour drawings of Turner...are to the last degree disappointing...On the other hand, photographs from rare proof engravings after, or monochrome drawings by, Turner, in which (as through the medium of photographs) colour does not interfere with the scale of gradation, are entirely satisfactory...For this reason photographs from Turner's "Liber Studiorum" - a collection which has only appeared in the form of sepia drawings or engravings thereof - possess, so to speak, a genuine documentary value...Turner did not consider that his task was completed when he placed his drawings in the hands of the engravers. On the contrary, he bestowed unremitted attention on the engraver's progress, frequently altering, correcting, and making additions...the photographs from the original drawings, taken by Mr. Thurston Thompson...and published by Messrs. Cundall and Downes, are by far the more estimable'. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.