One of the subjects executed at Knockholt was almost certainly the faded sepia drawing which hangs at present in the National Gallery, under the title of ‘Bridge and Cows’ (No. 504, N. G.); the engraving made from it was published (without a title) as the first ‘Pastoral’ subject in the first part of Liber.
This drawing is slightly faded, but the fading does not altogether account for its feeble and commonplace look. The design itself is feeble, the draughtsmanship petty, and the character of the figures and trees weak and amiable. These objects are not actually ‘out of drawing’—that is to say, incorrect from a physiological or botanical point of view, but they are sadly lacking in intention. They have a listless air, and seem to take very little interest either in themselves or in each other. They seem, indeed, to be mildly wondering why they are there at all. In a word, it is just the sort of drawing that an artist would make when external circumstances induced him to sit down to ‘do something,’ while no strongly-felt subject-matter within him was urgently demanding expression.
This drawing (it is in reverse of the engraving) was traced on to the copper, and the etching was made from it by Turner himself. The etching is practically an accurate copy of the drawing: the objects represented are the same in each, and neither the actions nor positions of any of the figures have been altered. Yet in the etching there is a perceptible briskening-up of everything. It all hangs together better than in the drawing. In some way the whole now seems to have come to life in the artist’s imagination. In the drawing we can see him laboriously bringing the parts together: in the etching he has infused the breath of life into them.
The change is due entirely to the execution. The line which defines the contours of the chief objects has lost its listlessness. It is now instinct with intention. Everywhere it hurries along, building up the design as a whole while defining the parts. The compulsion of the whole makes itself felt in every detail. It is certainly difficult to put into words the difference between the two versions, but I believe every one who will take the trouble to compare them carefully will be sure to feel it. In the two works there is an actual difference in the quality of the artist’s stream of consciousness, and the difference makes itself felt in the workmanship, though, in all probability, he himself was quite unaware of the difference in his frame of mind, and regarded the etching as simply a mechanical process of transference from one medium to another. Yet from a psychological point of view, the impulsion of his mind was in each case in a contrary direction. In the drawing the scene as a whole was being laboriously invoked piecemeal, a collection of objects was being formed into a sum total; in the etching the subject as a whole is a real and living thing, guiding the artist’s hand and moulding all the details into kinship with itself.
The whole now feels that certain of its parts require adjustment, i.e. demand to be brought into more intimate cohesion with the general purpose. The contrast between the rigidity of the dead branches of the willow on the right, and the springiness of the living branches nearer the foreground, calls out for clearer and
PLATE XXXVI
SCENE ON THE FRENCH COAST
SEPIA. ABOUT 1806