John Doman Turner

Supporting notes:

“After being introduced by art critic Frank Rutter, who described Turner as ‘an amateur with a remarkable gift for watercolour’, he received artistic training from Spencer Gore. Turner would send Gore his drawings and, in return for 5 shillings, Gore would respond with letters critiquing Turner’s work.

The Tate Archive reading room has copies of 30 to 40 letters written by Spencer Gore to John Doman Turner over five years, between 1908 and 1913, transcribed from the original Gore collection. Also included is a letter sent from Turner to Gore.

The first letter is dated 8th June 1908, sent from Garth House, Hertingfordbury. Gore explains how the tuition will work and then describes how Turner should mark his work so that it can be referred to in his critiques: ‘Number each drawing so that I can refer to… Draw anything that interests you.’

Looking at early sketchbook drawings of Turner’s, I noticed several works have numbers associated with them, which appear to correspond with the numbers in Gore’s critiques. I’ve been able to identify up to work No. 685, but the letters refer to work No. 900. This suggests that Turner completed over 900 works over five years.

The critiques begin

In the second letter, dated 26th June 1908, it’s clear Gore was not a fan of the sketchbook that Turner initially sent. He writes: ‘The first thing I should advise you do is to get a moderate-sized portfolio and draw on loose sheets of paper instead of a sketchbook… A drawing should grow like a plant, grow gradually round one point.’

Gore has scribbled faintly, in pencil, on the original drawing, asking ‘Why so dark?’ with two small pencil arrows pointing to areas in the trees. It was common for Gore to add all sorts of advice and curses regarding their technique during this written correspondence.

Source: https://artuk.org/discover/stories/john-doman-turner-letters-to-the-forgotten-camden-towner