Print collector's quarterly (4.1914)

TURNER AND HIS UNPUBLISHED
SERIES OF MEZZOTINTS

By EMIL H. RICHTER
Author of “Turner and the ‘Liber Studiorum,’” “Prints,” etc.


HE study of Turner’s mezzotints gives rise
to many questions which may never be
answered. We meet with them even in
the published portion of the famous “Liber

Studiorum/’ and this despite the abundance of avail-

able data. The exact date of engraving of the published
plates, their actual sequence, quite independent as it is
of the date of publication, leaves room for conjecture
and discussion. If we should ask these same questions of
date regarding the unpublished plates, we should find
absolute silence in the Turner records and see ourselves

obliged to reconstruct their history as best we may
from internal evidence offered by the prints themselves.
After the careful researches of Mr. Rawlinson, made for
the Compilation of his invaluable catalogues, and the
thorough exploration of Turneriana, in the catalogue by
Mr. Einberg,1 scant hope remains that much additional
documentary light may yet be shed on doubtful points.
In speaking of unpublished series, I have reference
not only to those “Liber” plates which remained un-
published in 1819; I would include also that smaller

1 A complete inventory of the Drawings of the Turner Bequest by
A. J. Einberg, London, 1909, 2 vols.

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