Turner Ship Painting

It depicts the building of the north african city of carthage with dido being the blue and white figure on the left.

Turner ship painting. The slave ship originally titled slavers throwing overboard the dead and dyingtyphoon coming on is a painting by the british artist j. The fighting temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up 1838 is an oil painting by the english artist joseph mallord william turner painted in 1838 and exhibited at the royal academy in 1839. Turner first exhibited in 1840. What is distinctive is the intense yellow hued.

The painting was based on a poem that described a slave ship caught in a typhoon and on the true story of the slave ship zong whose captain in 1781 had thrown overboard sick and dying slaves so that he could collect insurance money available only for slaves lost at sea. Measuring 35 34 in 48 14 in 91 cm 123 cm in oil on canvas it is now in the museum of fine arts boston. Dutch boats in a gale was commissioned by the third duke of bridgewater as a companion piece for a 17 th century seascape ships on a stormy sea by willem van de velde the younger. While turner continued to paint for another 11 years many consider this his greatest painting.

The veteran warship had played a distinguished role in the battle of trafalgar in 1805 but by 1838 was over 40 years old and had been sold off by the admiralty. In this painting turner shows ominous clouds and a stormy sea with boats struggling on the rough water. Turners painting shows the final journey of the temeraire as the ship is towed from sheerness in kent along the river thames to rotherhithe in south east london where it was to be scrapped. The subject of the painting is inspired by aeneid a latin epic poem written by virgil.

This a calm atmospheric painting influenced by the painter claude one of turners heroes. Turners work is celebrated for taking romanticism to new heights.