CADELL AGAIN-IONA NORTH END

This very fine Cadell view of Iona is coming up for sale. at the estimable Edinburgh auction house of Lyon& Turnbull  on Thursday 5 December. There are two other fine paintings by Bunty in the same sale. I have mounted adjacent  one of my photos of the actual scene. I wasnt aware of the match when i took  the photo.

Dunstanburgh-or Not?

This small watercolour above, by Turner, is on show in Berwick with a small selection of other works by him depicting Northumbrian scenes. The exhibition runs until 13 Oct 2019.

The sketch is part of the Turner Bequest and the cataloguers and commentators on the painting are uncertain what it it represents. They are right to be uncertain. Some, like Eric Shanes believe that it is likely a view of Dunstanburgh: others such as David Hill are reported as believing that Shanes is wrong. I tend to Hill's viewpoint.

The sun is either rising or setting. You can see its reflection in the water.If the central mass represents the bluff on which Dunstanburgh is sited-  and it does look a little like the view from the Heugh to the South, then the sun is rising quite far to the North. Would that really be possible even at midsummer?. It is most unlikely to be sunset but I suppose someone might claim that the light is reflecting in the meres inland of the castle.Nothing really fits.

When I first looked at the photo it seemed to me that Turner is showing a windmill on the left of what may or may not be a rocky outcrop. There seems to be a windmill and some trees to the right of it.There seem also to  be a couple of hesitant mark above but I now see that these are being interpreted as hints of a castle. The marks are crude and do not correspond to any possible viewpoint for Dunstanburgh.

I have walked over this area since childhood and still do so regularly. I have never heard or seen any traces of a windmill at Dunstanburgh. It can be a windy place but who would want to take their corn to such an isolated spot?I have also seen many illustrations of Dunstanburgh by artists such as by John Varley and the A W Hunt drawings of Dunstanburgh at the Ashmolean. In none of them, if I remember rightly does a windmill appear.

 Turner's views of Dunstanburgh are usually from the South and he at least understood the uneven nature of the site which falls from left to right in his views, something which is not always observed by artists. The fall in reality can be so extreme that it can appear that the base of the Lilburn Tower is higher than the top of the Eggynclough Tower.

Addition Nov 21,2020
I cannot find anything to suggest that this is really a watercolour of Dunstanburgh, or even the start of one.
You can see a photo of the drawing   in Gerald Wilkinson's Turner's Colour Sketches 1820-1834,this is clearer than my illustration.He calls it Promontory and Setting Sun  (page 191). It seems to me quite significant that Wilkinson makes no identification whatsoever for the subject.This work just cannot be Dunstanburgh, it has more of the block like nature of Warkworth-but I'm not suggesting that it is Warkworth.

Loch Creran, Argyll.

BONNARD EQUALS BOX OFFICE-HOW MUSEUMS ABUSE MASTERPIECES

Bonnard: View of the River, Vernon . It is in fact a view of his garden at Vernonnet with the Seine in the distance. Painted 1923.Edinburgh.

I have been reading the catalogue of the current Bonnard exhibition at the Tate and it has caused me some concern.It took quite bit of study to work out just which works are in the exhibition and to the best of my calculation I believe that it contains 91 paintings, several drawings and modern prints of Bonnard's photographs.


The exhibition is founded on the excellent Bonnards from the collection of Tate Modern along with some accompanying drawings. It also includes the two fine Bonnards from Edinburgh. So for quite some time members of the public will be unable to see these excellent paintings without paying a substantial fee. They will also be exposed to the vicissitudes of travel to at least one other venue. As far as I can see all of the  paintings are going to the Denmark showing and possibly also to Vienna. In Vienna the venue is a kunsthalle which has no collection of its own from  which to contribute.

To the best of my knowledge the Tate paintings are not usually displayed together in their home, but they are in this show. A lover of Bonnard would like to see this but equally a lover of Bonnard would have grave concerns about the presentation of such gorgeous paintings in  that joyless, underinvigilated, inhospitable mausoleum known as Tate Modern. But better  that they are preserved  because I don't really think that the Tate is fit to have custody of them.They would be more at home in the National Gallery.

Do not buy the catalogue.It really does not contribute anything of substance to Bonnard studies at all.Also, many of the illustrations are dreadful reproductions of the originals.The catalogue for the earlier Tate show is much better and if you want a general book on Bonnard you might as well read Tim Hyman's text. At least a painter is reflecting on another artist's work.

Also in the exhibition are old standards such as the standing nude from Brussels, the couple from Paris and the Atelier with Mimosas also from Paris.I have seen many Bonnard exhibitions starting with the unsurpassable show at the R.A of 1966 and these paintings have been in most of them.  I yield to no one in my love for Bonnard but possibly the most interesting-because critical- review of the exhibition that I have seen come from-of all people- Adrian Searle in The Guardian. He admits that he is not one of Bonnard's greatest fans but I do find that some of his reservations are very understandable. It isnt the usual Bonnard=bonheur equation by any means. For that reason alone it is worth a look.