| The Beacon Light | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Artist | J. M. W. Turner |
| Medium | Oil on canvas |
| Owner | National Museum of Wales |
The Beacon Light is a painting by J. M. W. Turner. It was given to the National Museum of Wales by the Davies sisters (Gwendoline and Margaret). For some time it was regarded as a fake, but is now accepted as authentic.
Beacon Light was among a number of works that were said to have been given by Turner to his mistress, Mrs Booth. It was sold at Christie's by her son, John Pound (her son by her first marriage).
In 1922, it was sold as a genuine Turner and the Davies sisters (Gwendoline and Margaret) spent £2,625 to buy it. [1] [2] Following the death of Gwendoline Davies, it was among seven works by Turner that were donated to the National Museum of Wales.
Shortly after the donation, some raised doubts about its authenticity and that of two other Turners donated by the sisters.
Butlin and Joll dated the work to c. 1835-1840 and suggest that it is a fragment of a larger canvas 'which has certainly been worked on by a hand other than Turner's'. [3] At that time, it was believed to depict the Needles on the Isle of Wight
It was removed from display, but did appear in a 2007 exhibition. It returned to display in September 2012. [4]
It was featured on the BBC TV programme Fake or Fortune? Scientific analysis showed that the paint used was consistent with Turner's known usage and that the same paint had been used for the whole of the picture. The evidence for the painting's authenticity was presented to Martin Butlin, the co-author of the Turner catalogue raisonné , who accepted that the work was genuine. [5]
An X-ray showed that a lighthouse at the summit of the bluff had been painted over. Philip Mould and Bendor Grosvenor were able to establish that the scene was in Kent and not on the Isle of Wight as had been previously believed. The coastline depicted is believed to be at St Margaret's at Cliffe, [6] where the dangers posed to shipping by the Goodwin Sands have long been recognised.
Joseph Mallord William Turner, known in his time as William Turner, was an English Romantic painter, printmaker and watercolourist. He is known for his expressive colouring, imaginative landscapes and turbulent, often violent marine paintings. He left behind more than 550 oil paintings, 2,000 watercolours, and 30,000 works on paper. He was championed by the leading English art critic John Ruskin from 1840, and is today regarded as having elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting.
Art forgery is the creation and sale of works of art which are intentionally falsely credited to other, usually more famous artists. Art forgery can be extremely lucrative, but modern dating and analysis techniques have made the identification of forged artwork much simpler.
Gregynog is a large country mansion in the village of Tregynon, 4 miles (6.4 km) northwest of Newtown in the old county of Montgomeryshire, now Powys in mid Wales. There has been a settlement on the site since the twelfth century. From the fifteenth to the nineteenth century it was the home of the Blayney and Hanbury-Tracy families. In 1960 it was transferred to the University of Wales as a conference and study centre by Margaret Davies, granddaughter of the nineteenth century industrial magnate and philanthropist, David Davies 'Top Sawyer' of Llandinam.
National Museum Cardiff, formerly known as the National Museum of Wales, is a museum and art gallery in Cardiff, Wales. The museum is part of the wider network of Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales. Entry is kept free by a grant from the Welsh Government.
Frank Weston Benson, frequently referred to as Frank W. Benson, was an American artist from Salem, Massachusetts, known for his Realistic portraits, American Impressionist paintings, watercolors and etchings. He began his career painting portraits of distinguished families and murals for the Library of Congress. Some of his best known paintings depict his daughters outdoors at Benson's summer home, Wooster Farm, on the island of North Haven, Maine. He also produced numerous oil, wash and watercolor paintings and etchings of wildfowl and landscapes.
View of Toledo, is one of the two surviving landscapes painted by El Greco, along with View and Plan of Toledo. View of Toledo is held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
Saint-Georges majeur au crépuscule refers to an Impressionist painting by Claude Monet, which exists in more than one version. It forms part of a series of views of the monastery-island of San Giorgio Maggiore. This series is in turn part of a larger series of views of Venice which Monet began in 1908 during his only visit there.
Gwendoline Elizabeth Davies, CH, was a Welsh philanthropist and patron of the arts who, with her sister Margaret, is recognised as the most influential collector of Impressionist and 20th-century art in Wales. She and her sister were independently wealthy, their fortune inherited from the businesses created by their grandfather, the industrialist David Davies. Davies and her sister created one of the most important private collections of art in Britain and donated their total of 260 works to what is now the National Museum Wales in the mid-20th century.
Margaret Sidney Davies, was a Welsh art collector and patron of the arts. With her sister Gwendoline, she bequeathed a total of 260 works, particularly strong in Impressionist and 20th-century art, which formed the basis of the present-day National Museum Wales' international collection. The sisters started the Gregynog Press in 1922 and the Gregynog Music Festival in 1933.
The Gregynog Press, also known as Gwasg Gregynog, is a printing press and charity located at Gregynog Hall near Newtown in Powys, Wales.
Vase with Poppies is an 1886 oil painting created in Paris, France by Post-Impressionist Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh.
Bords de la Seine à Argenteuil is an oil painting by an unknown artist. The painting is a landscape depicting the River Seine at Argenteuil in France. It is owned by Englishman David Joel.
The Procuress is the name given to a number of similar paintings by the Dutch Golden Age painter Dirck van Baburen. The painting is in the Caravaggiesque style of the Utrecht school.
Hugh Blaker (1873–1936) was an English artist, collector, connoisseur, dealer in Old Masters, museum curator, writer on art, and a supporter and promoter of modern British and French painters.
The Rabbit is an 1881 oil painting by the French artist Édouard Manet, now displayed at the National Museum Wales in Cardiff, Wales. The work is a still life featuring a hung rabbit or hare which has been placed on a hook outside a closed house window.
Still Life with Teapot is a still-life oil painting dating between 1902 and 1906, by the French artist Paul Cézanne. The subject of the painting is a table draped loosely with a patterned cloth on which lie fruit, crockery and a knife. The painting was acquired by the National Museum Wales in 1952 and is on display at the National Museum Cardiff.
Sunset at Montmajour is a landscape in oils painted by the Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh on 4 July 1888. It was painted while the artist was at Arles, France and depicts a landscape of garrigue with the ruins of Montmajour Abbey in the background. The painting is 73.3 cm × 93.3 cm. For over 100 years, it was in a Norwegian industrialist's private collection and wrongly assumed to be fake, before being re-examined, authenticated and sold to its current private owner. The painting was temporarily on display from 24 September 2013 until 12 January 2014 as part of an exhibition at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.
Landscape at Auvers in the Rain is an oil painting on canvas by the Dutch Post-Impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh.
Fishermen at Sea, sometimes known as the Cholmeley Sea Piece, is an early oil painting by English artist J. M. W. Turner. It was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1796 and has been owned by the Tate Gallery since 1972. It was the first oil painting by Turner to be exhibited at the Royal Academy. It was praised by contemporary critics and burnished Turner's reputation, both as an oil painter and as a painter of maritime scenes.
The Margate Jetty was a pier in Margate, Kent, in England initially constructed of wood in 1824. It was rebuilt in iron in 1855 and extended and added to over the years. It closed in 1976 over safety concerns and was severely damaged in a storm two years later. Demolition took many years and some parts remained until 1998.
