William Turner
Interno a Petworth

There are works, in every field of art, that lead to a different state of the artistic dimension; and, consequently, to a different state of consciousness. Works endowed with an autonomous expressive structure, an absoluteness found in music, for example. Figurative art does not escape this rule or peculiarity: William Turner, an English painter who mainly practiced his art in the first half of the 1800s, is an artist to whom we owe works strongly imprinted with these characteristics. Often categorized, perhaps not entirely accurately, within the romantic movement, he was an artist who enjoyed a long and extremely productive life, from line drawings to watercolors, to more accomplished oil paintings. And indeed, without detracting from his greatness as a draftsman and watercolorist, it is in these paintings that he reaches the pinnacle of his art, entirely unique, in the opinion of this writer. Fundamentally a landscape artist, Turner developed a completely unique conception of figurative art, which, in my opinion, finds its peak in a work that reaches the heights of an absoluteness common to all the great works of art of all times: the work is titled "Interior at Petworth" and it represents the interior of a room in the Petworth House, where the artist stayed as a guest of a patron. It is a work in which all the characteristics of the most mature Turner can be found summarized: "I did not paint for people to understand, but to show what that spectacle looked like" Turner used to say to those who asked him the meaning of his works; It is barely possible when observing "Interior at Petworth" to understand that it is a room in a grand mansion. The rest is the observer's role to assimilate all the expressive "information" that emanates from this work. Observing this room leads to a different state of consciousness: It is impossible to give a completed sense to the interpretation of this extraordinary painting. But it is precisely this impossibility that constitutes the secret of Turner's late works and in particular "Interior at Petworth". It is as if a mental and emotional mechanism is set in motion in the observer, desiring to be in that room... Figuratively, it is a large hall into which a sort of apse full of dazzling light opens, and it is unclear whether it is really an apse or whether it leads to another room. The room is full of scarcely distinguishable elements: one can glimpse curtains, a sort of bench, a thing on the left relatable to a little fountain, etc. But all this is irrelevant to the expressive power of the work. As mentioned previously, the desire to find oneself in this room is so strong that it makes everything else fade into the background. It is the strength of great art, from all eras, in any field. A sense of peace emanates from this vision, which can come only not from a human whim but from a sort of legitimate necessity. As if the artist becomes a conduit for a sort of truth, not coming from the recesses of his mind but from a dimension foreign to him, totally spiritual. With this concept, one can quietly conclude the analysis of a timeless work, completely accomplished and autonomous in its expressive form.