Rare Watercolor Discovered by Chance During Online Appraisal Service

After getting a watercolor painting appraised at Christie’s, a lucky collector learned they owned a valuable work by J.M.W. Turner, one of England’s greatest painters. Now, that painting could sell for half a million dollars at auction.

Usually, it’s best to be wary of online appraisals, but there are exceptions to everything. A collector submitted a picture of a watercolor painting to Christie’s online “Request an Estimate” service. It looked like a simple picture of a few greenish-blue waves, but Rosie Jarvie, Christie’s specialist in British drawings and watercolors, could tell it was something special.

Despite thinking the “image was poor” and noting it was “behind old glass,” making the painting difficult to see clearly, Jarvie “had an instinct…that we really needed to see this properly.” With help from historians Peter Bower and Ian Warrell, the painting was determined to be the work of English Romantic painter J.M.W. Turner, who had painted similar waves on similar paper during a visit to Venice in 1840.

With this in mind, the painting would have a very high value. It will be offered for sale in Christie’s Old Master & British Drawings auction on Feb. 4 with a presale estimate of $300,000 to $500,000.

According to the Metropolitan Museum, Joseph Mallard William Turner (1775-1851) is “the most versatile, successful, and controversial landscape painter of nineteenth-century England.” He is best known for his vast landscapes and dramatic scenes of ships on stormy seas. He achieved great fame during his lifetime, but he was also ahead of his time in many ways; for example, his preference for painting outdoors and his handling of light and color anticipated the Impressionist movement. In his will, he left all his finished work to the National Gallery in London, making the Turner Bequest the largest donation of artwork the gallery ever received.

Before Christie’s appraisal, the watercolor had been attributed to John Ruskin (1819-1900), the English polymath whose writings and philosophy helped shape the English Arts & Crafts movement. Ruskin was a fan and great defender of Turner during the latter’s lifetime and handled the Turner Bequest after his death.

A painting by Turner could sell for 10 times more than Ruskin’s. Turner’s works have sold at previous Christie’s auctions for as much as $33,595,000. Jarvie expects the presence of a Turner watercolor—a newly identified one, at that!—to “invite competition” at the upcoming auction.

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