Turner: In Light and Shade

J.M.W. Turner, Storm in the Pass of St. Gotthard, Switzerland, 1845, The Whitworth, Manchester. Photo: © The Whitworth, University of Manchester

J.M.W. Turner (1775–1851) remains one of Britain’s most renowned landscape painters whose work continues to inspire generations of artists. This exhibition explores his most remarkable but overlooked series of landscape prints, the Liber Studiorum. Translating as ‘Book of Studies’ and published in fourteen parts from 1807–19, Turner created the series at the height of his fame.

The exhibition will pair Turner’s evocative Liber prints with a series of Turner’s watercolours from the Whitworth’s collection, as well as loaned works from public and private collections. Visitors are invited to explore Turner's artistic legacy and the significance of his prints.

Last presented at the Whitworth over 100 years ago and marking 250 years since his birth, this exhibition presents all seventy-one of Turner’s published prints. Offering a fresh perspective on Turner. Together they show how the artist’s use of colour and atmospheric effects in painting were reimagined in print using line, tone and negative space.