"An Alpine Vista - thoughts on J.M.W. Turner" 2025
This year celebrates the 250th Birthday of J.M.W. Turner R.A. (1775 - 1851) - one of our foremost great visual artists - together with the 50th Anniversary of The Turner Society of which I am a founding member.
I felt inspired to pay tribute to this most important painter - on his mountainous wooded landscapes produced throughout the Italian and Swiss Alps, focusing also on his sublime watercolours (1840's)
For my 'Alpine Vista' piece I used a fragment of timber rescued from the sea. Pounded and battered by the waves stripping away splinters and layers of wood revealed emerging shapes almost too good to alter. My poetic imagination encouraged me to visually form a mountainous scene with almost 'Turnerian' features to make my art. The question now - How best to begin?Technique required much thought on how to present the piece simply and naturally expressive. With a neutral wash mixture (diluted oil paint/turps) to form and define the main elements, a daub of pale blue oil paint indicates a cloudless sky , and finally some minimal scratching or scraping out with a scalpel blade to suggest imagined detail e.g. waterfall and light reflection to mark a lake edge, thus completing the work.
Work II
"The Dandy Rock, Lough Erne - in homage to J.M.W. Turner" 2025
This small watercolour was painted directly in front of nature on a calm evening overlooking Lower Lough Erne at Killadeas, Co. Fermanagh. The small 'wooded shape' locally known as The Dandy Rock intrigued me as a subject to capture quickly in watercolour! Nothing is added nor any change made to the composition afterwards.
'Truthfulness and Simplicity' are the key points in my watercolour technique.
Mavis Thomson, S. R. U. A.
2025.