| Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Artist | J. M. W. Turner |
| Year | 1844 |
| Medium | oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 91 cm × 121.8 cm (36 in × 48.0 in) |
| Location | National Gallery, London |
Rain, Steam, and Speed – The Great Western Railway is an oil painting by the 19th-century British painter J. M. W. Turner.[1]
The painting was first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1844, though it may have been painted earlier.[i] It is now in the collection of the National Gallery, London. The painting gives an impression of great speed in a static painting, an attribute that distinguished Turner from other artists.[2] The work combines the power of nature and technology to create an emotional tension associated with the concept of the sublime.
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Transcription
FEMALE SPEAKER: We're looking at Turner's great painting "Rain, Steam, and Speed-- The Great Western Railway," which dates from 1844. MALE SPEAKER: A time when the railway was really crisscrossing the British landscape. FEMALE SPEAKER: Right. And was really a brand new way of traveling and connecting cities and people to each other. MALE SPEAKER: And would really change not only the landscape, but change society incredibly dramatically. It was probably the most potent symbol of industrialization. FEMALE SPEAKER: Turner really captures that feeling of the speed of the train coming toward us, the rain pounding at the train and the bridge as it moves toward us. I mean, I can almost feel the wetness of this day and hear the sound of the train. MALE SPEAKER: Well, the carriages were open, and so people really would have felt that. You think about what the speed of the train meant. I mean, of course, the trains then in 1844 didn't move at the speed that trains move now, but think about the speed with which people had traveled through history up to this point. People had either walked, or they had taken a horse. FEMALE SPEAKER: And if you were lucky, you took a carriage with multiple horses and could go a little bit faster. But not much. MALE SPEAKER: But a little bit faster. So that means you might have gone 15 miles an hour. And for the first time, people are being able to be transported mechanically. FEMALE SPEAKER: I think it's hard for us to recognize the radicalness of the railway. MALE SPEAKER: And the kind of impact it must've had on the landscape. Part of this is a kind of nostalgia for what's lost, right? The notion of the violence of this hulking iron monster ripping through the landscape. And it must have been loud. FEMALE SPEAKER: Surrounded by agricultural fields, perhaps, the way that Turner shows us a farmer on the right edge there. I think you look out at the landscape of this period, and you saw those contrasts between an old rural England and a new industrial England. MALE SPEAKER: That's absolutely right. I mean, on the left, you see that in the bridge, as well. In the extreme left, you see an old stone bridge. Here on the right, you have a modern industrial brick bridge meant to carry this railway. FEMALE SPEAKER: But so much of this is about the subject. But it's also about, obviously, the way Turner painted it. The atmosphere effects that we associate with Turner, this kind of gold and blue and brown coloring, and these thick imposto of paint that we can tell has been applied with a palette knife that's particularly thick toward the center and center line of the painting and in the upper right. MALE SPEAKER: It's so abstract that much the painting is actually unreadable in terms of anything specific. It is, you said, atmospheric. And it's atmospheric almost in an operatic way. Three quarters of this painting is nothing but the variations of color and tone of the sky, of the atmosphere, of the rain, and the way in which, in a sense, the rain creates a kind of unity and dissolves any kind of hard form. FEMALE SPEAKER: Any kind of specific reading of forms, right? MALE SPEAKER: The only one, really, that comes through with any real clarity is the black iron of that chimney of that train. FEMALE SPEAKER: That's true. And it's only the chimney. The rest of the train itself kind of dissolves into paint, as well. MALE SPEAKER: That idea of the confrontation between the industrial power of man and nature is probably most oddly juxtaposed by the train steaming towards a small rabbit in the lower right-hand corner that seems to be hopping away as quickly as possible. A rabbit, of course, a symbol of speed itself. FEMALE SPEAKER: I'm reminded that it's the power of hate that communicates to us more than the subject, that it's really about the textures and the colors and the globs of paint and the dissolution of form that communicate this idea of rain and atmosphere and speed and sound. It would've been a very different painting had it been painted differently. MALE SPEAKER: This painting is ostensibly about industrialization, about this powerful new thing, this train. But the painting really is about the act of painting itself. It is about the portrayal of this much more complex and much more subtle relationship between nature and man because of Turner's ability to handle tone and form with a kind of abstraction that is incredibly brave for this early period of the 19th century. FEMALE SPEAKER: It really is. I mean, it's close to the abstraction of the 20th century in many ways.
Background
The painting was painted close to the end of the Industrial Revolution, which brought a massive shift from an agrarian economy to one dominated by machine manufacturing in the Victorian era.[3] The railway was among the most potent symbols of industrialisation, since this new way of transportation heavily affected industrial and social life.[4] Turner seemed to be a generation ahead of other artists, as he was among the few painters at the time to consider industrial advancement as a commendable subject of art.[2] The painting suggests that modern technology is a reality racing towards us.[2]
The Great Western Railway (GWR) was one of a number of private British railway companies created to develop the new means of transport. The location of the painting is widely accepted as Maidenhead Railway Bridge, across the River Thames between Taplow and Maidenhead; a place that Turner had been exploring for over thirty years.[5] The view is looking east towards London. The bridge was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel and completed in 1839.
Description
Turner's painting illustrates an oncoming train in the countryside during a summer rainstorm. The train in the center is dark and rain-shrouded, surrounded by a golden natural landscape on both sides.[6] However, the train and bridge, the solid elements of the painting, are barely hinted at, disappearing into the hazy and unreal atmosphere. The mist rising from the water, the rain that veils the sky, and the steam from the locomotive are blurred and mixed, unifying the painting's colors.[2] In the lower-left corner of the painting, we can see a couple on a boat, making evident that the bridge is constructed on top of a river. In the bottom right of the painting, a hare runs along the track. Three white puffs of steam released by the engine into the air indicate that the train is in motion. The first, and nearest to the engine is the most distinct puff, while the other two gradually disappear in the horizon. For some, this detail expresses the idea of speed, as the puffs are progressively left behind.[7] However, they could equally well have been dispersed by the furious wind evident in the grey streaks painted across the viaduct. In the interior of the train, Turner depicted a crowd of waving figures that served as a reminder that the railway was a festive and popular entertainment.[7]
Artistic technique
Turner frequently created an atmospheric tonality in his artistic creations by spreading the paint in short, broad brushstrokes from a filthy palette onto the canvas and gradually drawing forms out of his color ground.[2] In the center of the painting and the upper right, Turner used thick impasto with a palette knife.[8] To illustrate the rain, he dabbed dirty putty on to the canvas with a trowel, whereas the sunshine scintillates out of thick, smeary chunks of chrome yellow.[5] Additionally, Turner used cool tones of crimson lake to illustrate the shadows and, even though the fire in the steam-engine appears to be red, it is most likely painted with cobalt and pea-green.[5] Structurally, the picture has a balanced arrangement of forms with its firm geometrical elements.[8]
Style and interpretation
Sublime
This celebrated picture demonstrates Turner's commitment to classical landscape, as well as his passion for experimentation and interest in the modern world.[9] The painting is interpreted as a celebration of travel and new technological power, with the railways representing the convergence of technology and natural forces.[10] These elements create an emotional tension associated with the overwhelming power of the sublime. The thrilling essence of speed was an innovative factor of life, with the power to alter our emotions of nature, while the steam of the locomotive provided a groundbreaking atmospheric scenery.[10] Turner was not painting a factual view of the Great Western Railway, but rather an allegory of the powers of nature and technology.[5]
Hare
A hare runs along the track in the bottom right of the painting, possibly symbolizing speed itself.[5] Some think this is a reference to the limits of technology.[2] Others believe the animal is running in fear of the new machinery and Turner meant to hint at the danger of man's new technology destroying the sublime elements of nature.[12] Turner considered both hound and hare as the most characteristic emblems of speed, in which the hare does everything in its power to stay safe from the predator who chases it. In fact, he had used these symbols in previous works. In the 1810s, in Battle Abbey; the Spot Where Harold Fell, and later in 1837, in the Apollo and Daphne, he portrayed this detail of a hare being chased. A hare was likely to outpace a Great Western steam locomotive pulling a luggage train of open passenger wagons as depicted by Turner yet in Rain, Steam, and Speed, the modern observer might experience a feeling the poor hare could be crushed in an instant.[5] It is speculated that Turner, played on the idea of an animal chase, aware that a Great Western Firefly type of passenger locomotive engine was named Greyhound but his rendering of the engine is so indistinct to prevent any identification of its type and, in any case, fast and powerful Firefly locomotives were not allocated to luggage trains.[5][13]
Analogues
Some people interpret this painting as analogous to that of The Fighting Temeraire, since there seems to be a transition from the past towards the future as the train speeds towards us.[5] Additionally, both paintings create a contrast between technology and the beautiful, peaceful landscape.[5] Other interpretations say that at the left of the painting, Turner features a second stone bridge that serves as an analogue to the bridge in Apullia and Appullus of 1814, emphasizing that both principal structural elements have been pushed to the edges of the canvas.[14]
See also
Notes
- ^ The Great Western began running trains from 1838.
References
- ^ Gerald E. Finley (1999), Angel in the Sun: Turner's vision of history, McGill-Queen's Press, ISBN 0-7735-1747-2
- ^ a b c d e f Walther, Ingo F., Suckale, Robert, and Eschenburg, Barbara. Masterpieces of Western Art : a History of Art in 900 Individual Studies. Köln ; London: Taschen, 1996.
- ^ Dietz, Frederick C. The Industrial Revolution. New York: H. Holt and Co, 1927.
- ^ Wilde, Robert (27 August 2020). "The Railways in the Industrial Revolution". thoughtco.com.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Gage, John. Turner: Rain, Steam, and Speed. London, 1972. pp. 19–22. Cited in Hugh Honour. Romanticism. New York, 1979.
- ^ J. H. Lienhard, How Invention Begins: And How it Finds Its Final Form. (Oxford University Press, 2006)
- ^ a b Gage, John. Turner: Rain, Steam, and Speed. London, 1972. pp. 19–22. Cited in Hugh Honour. Romanticism. New York, 1979.
- ^ a b Wilton, Andrew. Turner In His Time. New York: Abrams, 1987.
- ^ Wilton, Andrew. Turner In His Time. New York: Abrams, 1987.
- ^ a b Wilton, Andrew. J. M. W. Turner: His Art And Life. New York: Rizzoli, 1979.
- ^ Gage, John, 1938-2012. Turner: Rain, Steam, And Speed. [New York: Viking Press], 1972.
- ^ Meslay, Olivier (2005). J. M. W. Turner: The Man Who Set Painting on Fire. 'New Horizons' series. Translated by Sharman, Ruth. London: Thames & Hudson. p. 133. ISBN 9780500301180.
- ^ Wilton, Andrew. J. M. W. Turner: His Art And Life. New York: Rizzoli, 1979.
- ^ Wilton, Andrew. J. M. W. Turner: His Art And Life. New York: Rizzoli, 1979.
External links
Media related to Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway at Wikimedia Commons- National Gallery page on the painting.
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| Locomotives | ||
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| Train services | ||
| Rolling stock | ||
| People | ||
| Canals | ||
| Other | ||
This page was last edited on 8 March 2024, at 12:54