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Joseph Mallord William Turner, known as J. M. W. Turner (Born London, 23 April 1775; died Chelsea, Middlesex [now in London], 19 December 1851). English painter, one of the greatest figures in the history of landscape painting. His family called him Bill or William, but he is now invariably known as J. M. W. Turner (which is how he usually signed his pictures). He showed a talent for drawing from an early age and as a boy earned money by colouring prints. In 1789 he began working as a draughtsman for the architect Thomas Hardwick, and later in the same year he enrolled at the Royal Academy Schools, where he studied regularly until 1793 and intermittently until 1799. Early in his student days he also had lessons from Thomas Malton (1748–1804), a topographical watercolourist who specialized in neat and detailed town views and whom he later described as ‘my real master’.

Text source: The Oxford Dictionary of Art and Artists (Oxford University Press)


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