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Snow Storm – Steam-Boat off a Harbour’s Mouth
J. M. W. Turner · Romanticism & Landscape
- Artist
- Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775–1851)
- Date
- 1842
- Dimensions
- 91.4 x 121.9 cm
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Location
- Tate Britain, London, United Kingdom
In Snow Storm, Turner plunges the viewer into the heart of a storm at sea. A steamboat, barely visible, struggles in a vortex of wind, snow, waves and smoke, sending signals to avoid running aground.
A closer look
The composition is a whirling spiral of dark and light that swallows the boat at its centre. There is no horizon, no fixed point: sea and sky merge into a single movement. Turner claimed to have been on board during the storm and to have had himself tied to the mast for four hours to observe it, although the story may be invented. Critics of the time mocked the painting as a mass of “soapsuds and whitewash”, which deeply hurt the artist.
More by J. M. W. Turner
In this gallery
Landscape with a Rainbow
The Fighting Temeraire Tugged to Her Last Berth to Be Broken Up
Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway
The Slave Ship (Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying)
Norham Castle, Sunrise