Now if Impressionism aims at getting rid of all the cognitive elements in concrete perception (recognition, classing, naming, etc.) as well as the later processes of interpretation and associative reflection, and would express only the bare sensational element of impression, it is clear that Turner cannot be properly described as an Impressionist. Turner’s artistic aim was consistently lyrical, i.e. strongly subjective and emotional, while the chief aim of Impressionism is to eliminate all the merely subjective colouring from perception, with the single purpose of isolating and reproducing what is regarded as the objective element. So far, then, as Impressionism has adopted Turner’s results, it seems open to the charge of having done so without understanding their real nature or significance.
Yet this result, however helpful it may prove to the student of present-day art, cannot be wholly satisfactory from another point of view. From the point of view of Turner’s work our result is largely negative. We have endeavoured to make it clear that to regard his later work as a new and triumphant attempt to represent what is called the ‘truths of nature’ is pure misunderstanding; that Turner’s aim is not to represent either truths of atmosphere, of lighting or of natural colour, or any kind or class of physical fact; that he is busied mainly with his own emotions and fancies, and that he is concerned with the objective
PLATE LXXIII
MEN CHATTING ROUND FIREPLACE: PETWORTH HOUSE
WATER COLOUR. ABOUT 1830
PLATE LXXIV