Joseph Mallord William Turner, Snow Storm - Steam-Boat off a Harbour’s Mouth exhibited 1842. Tate.
9 rooms in JMW Turner
Turner was fascinated by the darker side to life at sea. He painted storms, shipwrecks and terrifying atmospheres over and over, leaving many of them unfinished
The sea swelled in Turner’s imagination during the last twenty years of his life. He painted it more frequently and more boldly, placing atmosphere centre stage. He wanted us to feel the sea’s power and volatility as if we were there, swept up in a swirling vortex of wind and waves or the foreboding bleak, open water.
His paintings of steamships and whale hunts showed how modern technology and marine industry could be painted with great profundity. Turner’s take on them as battles between man and nature brought a new dimension to the art of terror, the Sublime. To our eyes, polluting steamships and the hunting of whales might also open up questions about the environmental cost of humanity’s relationship with the sea. Turner’s depictions of shipwrecks highlighted how the faults and flaws of humankind could be the cause of maritime disasters, too.
In late life, Turner regularly visited the resort towns of the Kent coast, particularly Margate. He felt an affinity with mariners and allowed his neighbours in London to think he was a retired Admiral. On a visit to Turner’s studio, the US sea captain Elisha Ely Morgan is said to have seen ‘through all the fog and mystery’ ‘how much real sea feeling there was in him and his work’.
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Whalers Boiling Blubber c.1845
This heavily and dynamically worked sheet from Turner's 'Whaler's' sketchbook can be related to the left-hand portion of his oil 'Whalers (Boiling Blubber) Entangled in Flaw Ice, Endeavouring to Extricate Themselves', displayed in Gallery 101. Turner used whaling as a subject for a number of pictures in the mid-1840s, apparently inspired by a reading of Thomas Beale's 'The Natural History of the Sperm Whale' (1839). Other sheets in the 'Whalers' sketchbook, as the name suggests, are devoted to the industry.
Gallery label, February 1993
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artworks in Toil and Terror at Sea
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Vessels at Sea c.1844–5
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Joseph Mallord William Turner, Snow Storm - Steam-Boat off a Harbour’s Mouth exhibited 1842
In a contest of natural and mechanical energies, a steamboat battles a blizzard. It is taking soundings ‘by the lead line’ to determine the depth of water. The title specifies what is happening in precise nautical terms but Turner added some autobiographical narrative, claiming he experienced the storm. Later he said he had been lashed to the mast and had not expected to survive. There is no record of a steamboat called Ariel leaving Harwich in 1841–2 but a brig, Fairy, sank with all hands in November 1840.
Gallery label, November 2022
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artworks in Toil and Terror at Sea
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Whalers exhibited 1845
Turner exhibited four paintings of whaling at the Royal Academy: two in 1845 and two in 1846. His patron Elhanan Bicknell was a partner in a whaling firm. Bicknell bought one of the 1845 paintings but disliked its finish and returned it. These three oil paintings did not find buyers.
Gallery label, November 2022
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artworks in Toil and Terror at Sea
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Whalers (Boiling Blubber) Entangled in Flaw Ice, Endeavouring to Extricate Themselves exhibited 1846
The Southern Whale Fishery was a major industry in Turner’s lifetime. Whale oil was a valuable commodity for lighting and lubrication, with market prices listed in the newspapers like Brent Crude oil is today. By the 1840s the British operation was in terminal decline. Its ships were increasingly uncompetitive, especially after the import tariff on foreign oil was reduced in 1843
Gallery label, November 2022
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artworks in Toil and Terror at Sea
Joseph Mallord William Turner, A Disaster at Sea ?c.1835
This unfinished painting was probably based on a real incident, the loss of the Amphitrite in September 1833. The ship sailed from Woolwich, London, bound for New South Wales. On board were 108 women convicted of crimes in Britain, and 12 children. Gale-force winds drove the ship on to a sandbank off Boulogne, France. The captain refused all offers of rescue. The Amphitrite broke up, all the women and children drowned and only three members of the crew survived. Turner had probably seen Théodore Géricault’s Raft of the Medusa when it was exhibited in London in 1820, and used a similar pyramidal arrangement of the figures.
Gallery label, November 2022
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artworks in Toil and Terror at Sea
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Rough Sea with Wreckage c.1840–5
While parts of this painting such as the flotsam in the foreground are unfinished, the carefully and solidly modelled clouds are well developed. Turner has realised his theme by depicting a break in the clouds at the centre of the sky, through which a shaft of light illuminates an area of calmer waters and a white sail. However, it is uncertain whether the boat has escaped the storm, or is heading into danger.
Gallery label, February 2010
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artworks in Toil and Terror at Sea
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Yacht Approaching the Coast c.1840–5
In this unfinished sea painting the light of the sun, reflected by the water, dazzles the eye and obscures the view. This visual effect echoes the progress of Turner’s own work on the painting. He returned to areas of the canvas over a period of several years, covering the original subject. Dark shapes that appear through the layers suggest boats. The buildings on the left have not been definitively identified but may represent Venice. By reworking the canvas Turner has shifted the focus of this painting from the yacht to a less tangible subject—that of light itself.
Gallery label, November 2021
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artworks in Toil and Terror at Sea
Joseph Mallord William Turner, Rough Sea c.1840–5
Although left in a rudimentary state, this picture suggests a stormy sea with choppy waves beneath a blank sky. Turner’s brushstrokes at the corners of the painting could indicate that he intended to create a whirling vortex of waves and clouds, just as he did in Snow Storm: Steamboat off a Harbour’s Mouth (1842).
A dark shape at the centre of the work could be a large ship or a pier, and it has been suggested that two reddish-brown shapes on either side may be the sails of smaller boats.
Gallery label, February 2010
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