09 Classic Works of Art, Marine Paintings - With Footnotes, #30

Joseph Mallord William Turner
Ships a Sea, getting a Good Wetting, 1844
Oil on canvas
 J. Paul Getty Museum

Joseph Mallord William Turner, RA (baptised 14 May 1775 – 19 December 1851) was an English Romanticist landscape painter. Turner was considered a controversial figure in his day, but is now regarded as the artist who elevated landscape painting to an eminence rivalling history painting.

Although renowned for his oil paintings, Turner is also one of the greatest masters of British watercolour landscape painting. He is commonly known as "the painter of light" and his work is regarded as a Romantic preface to Impressionism. More on Joseph Mallord William Turner

Montague Dawson
TEARING ON” / THE ‘WILD RANGER’ 1044 TONS BUILT IN 1853
Oil on canvas
50.8 x 77.5 cm.
Private collection

This painting depicts the three-masted clipper ship WILD RANGER in rough seas. Most of the ships sails are unfurled. This ship conducted trade between America and Australia during 1857 and 1860.

The era of the clipper ships was dominated by a sense of romance, competition, national pride and innovative technology. The sleek and graceful ships were a symbol of modernity in America and a fundamental part of the expanding global economy. Their design concentrated on speed instead of cargo capacity, a great benefit to shipping companies eager to transport goods quickly. The WILD RANGER was a 1044 ton clipper ship built by J O Curtis at Medford, Massachusetts in 1853. It made a number of journeys from America to Sydney and Melbourne between 1857- 1860, before being renamed OCEAN CHIEF in 1862. The vessel foundered off Australia’s coast in 1872. It is claimed the crew wanted to abandon the ship for the gold fields and exacerbated its destruction by boring holes in the pumps. More on the WILD RANGER

Montague Dawson, 1890–1973
TEARING ON” / THE ‘WILD RANGER’ 1044 TONS BUILT IN 1853
Detail

Montague Dawson RMSA, FRSA (1890–1973) was a British painter who was renowned as a maritime artist. His most famous paintings depict sailing ships, usually clippers or warships of the 18th and 19th centuries. Montague was the son of a keen yachtsman and the grandson of the marine painter Henry Dawson (1811–1878), born in Chiswick, London. Much of his childhood was spent on Southampton Water where he was able to indulge his interest in the study of ships. For a brief period around 1910 Dawson worked for a commercial art studio in Bedford Row, London, but with the outbreak of the First World War he joined the Royal Navy. Whilst serving with the Navy in Falmouth he met Charles Napier Hemy (1841–1917), who considerably influenced his work. In 1924 Dawson was the official artist for an Expedition to the South Seas by the steam yacht St.George. During the expedition he provided illustrated reports to the Graphic magazine.

After the War, Dawson established himself as a professional marine artist, concentrating on historical subjects and portraits of deep-water sailing ships. During the Second World War, he was employed as a war artist. Dawson exhibited regularly at the Royal Society of Marine Artists, of which he became a member, from 1946 to 1964, and occasionally at the Royal Academy between 1917 and 1936. By the 1930s he was considered one of the greatest living marine artists, whose patrons included two American Presidents, Dwight D Eisenhower and Lyndon B Johnson, as well as the British Royal Family. Also in the 1930s, he moved to Milford-Upon-Sea in Hampshire, living there for many years. Dawson is noted for the strict accuracy in the nautical detail of his paintings which often sell for six figures.

The work of Montague Dawson is represented in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich and the Royal Naval Museum, Portsmouth. More on Montague Dawson

Thomas Luny, ST. EWE, CORNWALL 1759 - 1837 LONDON
THE BOMBARDMENT OF ALGIERS, 27 AUGUST 1816
Oil on canvas
39 3/4  by 50 in.; 101 by 127 cm.
Private Collection

The action was under the command of Admiral Lord Exmouth off Algiers on 27 August 1816.  Following Napoleon’s final defeat in 1815, the Royal Navy no longer needed the assistance of the Barbary States as a source of supplies for Gibraltar and would no longer tolerate further threat of piracy in the Mediterranean, or the systemic enslavement of Europeans in North Africa.  A  diplomatic mission was undertaken to secure the release of British subjects held in captivity.  However, when Algerian troops massacred two hundred Corsican, Sicilian and Sardinian fishermen who were under British protection, it was finally decided that action should be taken.

Thomas Luny, ST. EWE, CORNWALL 1759 - 1837 LONDON
THE BOMBARDMENT OF ALGIERS, 27 AUGUST 1816
Detail

The fleet reached Algiers on 27 August and, when no answer was given to Lord Exmouth’s demands for the release of prisoners, the order was given to fire.  The fire was returned and a fierce action ensued, lasting eight hours.  The Algerian batteries were destroyed, along with thirty-three Algerian vessels and much of the town.  The result was the release of three thousand European slaves, over a thousand of them British, along with the British Consul. Lord Exmouth returned to England in triumph. More on the action

Thomas Luny (1759–1837), born in Cornwall, an English artist and painter, mostly of seascapes and other marine-based works. At the age of eleven, Luny left Cornwall to live in London. There he became the apprentice of Francis Holman. Luny remained until 1780 in Holman's London studio.

In September 1777, Luny journied  to France. During this particular expedition, Luny almost certainly strayed from France itself; his first exhibited picture in London, seen at the Society of Artists that same year.

Luny left Holman's studio in 1780. It was around this time that Luny was frequently exhibiting at the Royal Academy, in a total of twenty-nine exhibitions between 1780 and 1802. In Leadenhall Street, Luny became acquainted with a "Mr. Merle", a dealer and framer of paintings who promoted Luny's paintings for over twenty years, to great success. Luny also found a wealthy source of business in Leadenhall Street, where the British East India Company had their headquarters; their officers commissioned many paintings and portraits from Luny. Luny was occasionally invited as a guest on the Company's ships on special occasions and voyages.

Several years later, in 1807, Luny decided to move again, this time to Teignmouth in Devon. There he received a number of commissions. Luny was by that time suffering with arthritis in both of his hands. This had no obvious impact on the quality or pace of his artistic work. In fact, of his lifetime oeuvre of over 3,000 works, over 2,200 were produced between 1807 and his death.[2] He died on 30 September 1837. More Thomas Luny

Circle of Claude-Joseph Vernet
A MEDITERRANEAN HARBOR SCENE WITH FIGURES ON THE SHORE, AND FISHERMEN LAUNCHING A BOAT
Oil on canvas
9 3/4  by 12 3/4  in.; 24.7 by 32.5 cm.
Private Collection

Claude-Joseph Vernet (born Aug. 14, 1714, Avignon, France—died Dec. 3, 1789, Paris) was a French landscape and marine painter whose finest works, the series of 15 Ports of France (1754–65), constitute a remarkable record of 18th-century life.

The son of a decorative painter, Vernet worked in Rome (1734–53), finding inspiration both in the expansive, luminous art of the 17th-century French master Claude Lorrain and in the dramatic and picturesque work of the 17th-century Italian painter Salvator Rosa. Vernet’s shipwrecks, sunsets, and conflagrations reveal an unusually subtle observation of light and atmosphere. With his compatriot Hubert Robert, he catered to a new taste for idealized, somewhat sentimentalized landscapes. After returning to Paris he became a member of the French Royal Academy and was commissioned by King Louis XV to paint the port series. The decline in his later work is attributed to overproduction. The family tradition of painting was maintained by his son Carle Vernet and his grandson Horace Vernet. More on Claude-Joseph Vernet


John George Brown, 1831 - 1913
HEADING OUT, c. 1878
Oil on canvas
20 1/2 by 30 inch
Private Collection

John George Brown (November 11, 1831 – February 8, 1913) was a British citizen and an American painter born in Durham, England on November 11, 1831. His parents apprenticed him to the career of glass worker at the age of fourteen in an attempt to dissuade him from pursuing painting. He studied nights at the School of Design in Newcastle-on-Tyne while working as a glass cutter there between 1849 and 1852 and evenings at the Trustees Academy in Edinburgh while working at the Holyrood Glass Works between 1852 and 1853. After moving to New York City in 1853, he studied with Thomas Seir Cummings at the National Academy of Design where he was elected a National Academician in 1861. Brown was the Academy's vice-president from 1899 to 1904.

Around 1855, he worked for the owner of the Brooklyn Glass Company, and later he married the daughter of his employer. His father-in-law encouraged his artistic abilities, supporting him financially, letting Brown pursue painting full-time. In 1866, he became one of the charter members of the Water-Color Society, of which he was president from 1887 to 1904. Brown became famous for his depictions of street urchins found on the streets of New York (bootblacks, street musicians, posy sellers, newsboys, etc.).

Brown's art is best characterized as British genre paintings adapted to American subjects. Essentially literary, Brown's paintings are executed with precise detail, but poor in color, and more popular with the general public than with connoisseurs. More on John George Brown

Kurt Craemer, German, 1912-1961 
Fish Carrier, c. 1947
Oil on burlap 
40 x 32 inches 
Private Collection

Kurt Craemer (born March 2, 1912 in Saarbrücken, Germany , October 1, 1961 in the province of Salerno ) was a German painter , designer and illustrator . Craemer, whose family relocated from Saarbrücken to Duesseldorf in 1919, was a pupil at the Cologne school in 1928. In 1930, at eighteen-year-old he was a pupil of Paul Klee until 1933.

His first journey to Italy was in 1932. Craemer went to Ascona , Siena and Ischia and in 1934 he spent his time with his friend and teacher Karli Sohn-Rethel in Positano. There were always shorter visits to Düsseldorf. An arranged exhibition in Duesseldorf was prohibited as unwelcome and degenerate.

In 1938 he buried his father in Düsseldorf and returned immediately to Ischia. He rented a house shortly before the outbreak of the war. In 1939 Craemer brought his mother to Italy and tore the last roots with his country of origin. He spent his time during the war on the island of Procida.

In the same year Kurt Craemer fell ill with child paralysis and was paralyzed up to his hips. A new beginning at the end of 1939, now sitting in a wheelchair, was to take place in Florence. He moved to the pension of the sister Bandini at Piazza Santo Spirito. Fleeing the war brought him back to Positano, his choice as a permanent domicile at the Marina.

Apart from his closest friends and direct neighbors, there was hardly any dealings in the German language and German picture-buyers for a long time. Englishmen, Americans, Australians, and South Africans came here. Restrained by his handicap, he faced the world with humor and self-irony, humanity, and sociable temperament.  

In 1952 and 1958 Craemer participated in the Biennale di Venezia . His only German post-war exhibition took place at the Düsseldorfer Galerie Hella Nebelung. In spring 1961 he had an exhibition in the United States.

Until his death on 1 October 1961 he lived in Positano. He died in an accident on the Cilento coast. Cramer's works, most of which were made in Positano in the 1940s and 1950s, represent an important chapter in the history of the art of the province of Salerno. In 2012 the city of Positano celebrated with a centennial, Kurt Craemer, an artist with a love for Positano, Who spent most of his life there. In the exhibition "Il Sud Antico di Kurt Craemer", thirty selected works of the entire period were donated to Positano by the nephew. More Kurt Craemer

William Trost Richards, 1833 - 1905
AFTERNOON, LONG BEACH, N.J., c. 1884
Oil on canvas
18 7/8 by 30 1/4 inches, (47.9 by 76.8 cm)
Private Collection

Long Beach Island is a barrier island and summer colony along the Atlantic Ocean coast of Ocean County, New Jersey in the United States. The island has been continuously settled since 1690, initially being a destination for hunters. Barnegat Inlet, to the north of the island, was an important path for freight shipments and whaling from the 17th century through the 20th century. More on Long Beach

William Trost Richards (June 3, 1833 – November 8, 1905) was an American landscape artist. He was associated with both the Hudson River School and the American Pre-Raphaelite movement. He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Between 1850 and 1855 he studied part-time with the German artist Paul Weber while working as designer and illustrator of ornamental metalwork. Richards first public showing was part of an exhibition in New Bedford, Massachusetts, organized by artist Albert Bierstadt in 1858.

In 1862 he was elected honorary member of the National Academy of Design and Academician in 1871. In 1863, he became a member of the Association of the Advanced of Truth in Art, an American Pre-Raphaelite group. In 1866, he departed for Europe for one year. Upon his return and for the following six years he spent the summers on the East Coast.

In the 1870s, he produced many acclaimed watercolor views of the White Mountains, several of which are now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Richards exhibited at the National Academy of Design from 1861 to 1899, and at the Brooklyn Art Association from 1863 to 1885. He was elected a full member of the National Academy in 1871.

He died on April 17, 1905 in Newport, Rhode Island. More on William Trost Richards

Marc-Aurèle Fortin
Port of Montreal, circa 1928
Watercolour
9 x 9.75 in, 23 x 25 cm
Private Collection

Marc-Aurèle Fortin (March 14, 1888 – March 2, 1970) was a Québécois painter, born in 1888 in Ste-Rose, Quebec. He studied art in Montreal and worked at the Montreal Post Office, and at an Edmonton bank. He studied art abroad. He was known for painting watercolour landscapes of the St. Lawrence Valley. He travelled around the St. Lawrence Valley by bicycle. Fortin believed that "Canadian artists should take their inspiration from the countryside and progress towards a national art... We should excel in landscapes, exactly as the French do".

He was part of the first Atelier exhibition at Henry Morgan Galleries in April 1932 together with Atelier founder John Goodwin Lyman, André Biéler, and Edwin Holgate. Fortin was exhibited by Galerie L'Art français from the 1940s.

His works are displayed at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in Montreal. He was a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. He died in 1970. More Marc-Aurèle Fortin

Marc-Aurèle Fortin
Port of Montreal, 1928
watercolour
8 x 10.5 in, 20.5 x 26.5 cm
Private Collection





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