History Connections RGB.indd - Art Gallery of South Australia

Tur n e r
from the Tate
the making of a master
8 February – 19 May 2013
S TAG E 1 A N D 2
H I S TO RY C U R R I C U L U M C O N N E C T I O N S
TURNER’S History Curriculum Connections
J.M.W. Turner is regarded as one of the greatest landscape painters. By viewing Turner’s work in this
exhibition students are provided with insights into the life and events in Britain and Europe during the
late eighteenth to mid-nineteenth centuries.
The works of art listed below from the Turner exhibition have been selected to enable students to
explore how the artist captured his turbulent times – slavery, migration, the Industrial Revolution,
conflicts and modernisation.
These works are a primary source for research.
Issues
Globalisation: a time of great expansion of the British Empire through naval and trade domination
Folkstone from the Sea (No. 31, gallery 3) shows the perilous life of illegal trade by smugglers in the English Channel.
Peace – Burial at Sea (No. 61, gallery 5) records a sad event for Turner and also captures the changes from sail to
steam-driven shipping.
Migration: transport of convicts (to Australia)
A Disaster at Sea also known as The Wrecked Female Convict Ship, the Amphitrite: Women and Children Abandoned
in a Gale (No. 57, gallery 5) shows British convict women and children shipwrecked en route to the penal settlement
of New South Wales.
Revolution: the Industrial Revolution in Britain: steam power, transport, mass production
Dartmouth on the River Dart (gallery 3) records the extensive shipbuilding being undertaken in the harbour.
cover detail: J.M.W. Turner, Scarborough town and castle: morning: boys catching crabs,c.1810; Gift from the collection of the late Mrs S.M. Crabtree by her children
Rosalind, Robert, Richard and John assisted by the Roy and Marjory Edwards Bequest Fund and the Art Gallery of South Australia Foundation to commemorate the
Gallery’s 125th anniversary 2006. Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.
Issues
Conflict: Britain and the Napoleonic Wars.
Spithead: Two Captured Danish Ships Entering Portsmouth Harbour (No. 23, gallery 4) shows captured ships, the spoils of
the war with Napoleon, being brought into Portsmouth, Britain’s main naval base.
War: The Exile and the Rock Limpet (No. 60, gallery 5) is a symbolic depiction of Napoleon in exiled disgrace after his
defeat by the British.
detail: J.M.W. Turner, Spithead: Two Captured Danish Ships Entering Portsmouth Harbour, 1807–9. © Tate, 2013
Modernisation: development of industrial capitalism; new technologies; sail power to steam transport
City of Oxford from the South West (No. 1, gallery 1) is a topographical view of a country village with evidence of
traditional agricultural practice.
The Thames above Waterloo Bridge (No. 56, gallery 5) shows the new phenomena of industrial pollution in the city
of London.
Issues
Cultural: observations of people’s lifestyle during Turner’s time
Buttermere Lake, with part of Cromackwater, Cumberland, a shower (No. 12, gallery 2) shows traditional rural livelihoods.
Scarborough town and castle: morning: boys catching crabs (No. 24, gallery 3) records the lifestyle of coastal dwellers.
A Country Blacksmith Disputing Upon the Price of Iron … (No. 22, gallery 3) illustrates the Industrial Revolution’s impact
on the price of iron for traditional industries.
Creative works
Investigate the impact of classicism and the romantic movement on the art, poetry and literature of Turner and his
contemporaries.
Dido and Aeneas (No. 18, gallery 2)
Mercury sent to Admonish Aeneas (No. 65, gallery 5)
The Tenth Plague of Egypt (No. 16, gallery 2) is based on Virgil’s Poem The Aeneid.
These pieces show Turner’s use of biblical and classical mythology as a source of inspiration for Academy exhibition
entries.
J.M.W. Turner is regarded as one of the greatest landscape painters. By viewing Turner’s work in this exhibition students
are provided with insights into the life and events in Britain and Europe during the late eighteenth to mid-nineteenth
centuries.
The works listed below from the Turner exhibition have been selected to enable students to explore how the artist
captured his turbulent times – slavery, migration, the Industrial Revolution, conflicts and modernisation.
These works are a primary source for research.
Thematic Study
Topic 1: Pain and Gain: Modernisation and Society since c.1700
A Country Blacksmith Disputing Upon the Price of Iron … (No. 22, gallery 3) illustrates the Industrial Revolution’s impact
on the price of iron for traditional industries.
The Thames above Waterloo Bridge (No. 56, gallery 5) shows the new phenomena of industrial pollution in the city
of London.
Topic 2: Revolutions and Turmoil: Social and Political Upheavals since c.1500
Spithead: Two Captured Danish Ships Entering Portsmouth Harbour (No. 23, gallery 4) shows captured ships, the spoils of the
war with Napoleon, being brought into Portsmouth, Britain’s main naval base.
War: The Exile and the Rock Limpet (No. 60, gallery 5) is a symbolic depiction of Napoleon in exiled disgrace after his
defeat by the British.
Topic 3: A Sense of Belonging: Groups and Nations since c.1500
Gallery 3 displays works with the theme Britain: The Home Front. Turner has painted works about Britain’s naval power
and domination of the seas, which enabled the expansion of the British Empire.
Topic 4: The Captives, the Unwanted and the Seekers: Forced and Free Migration since c.1500
A Disaster at Sea also known as The Wrecked Female Convict Ship, the Amphitrite: Women and Children Abandoned in
a Gale (No. 57, gallery 5) shows British convict women and children shipwrecked en route to the penal settlement
of New South Wales.
Essay
Students could use Turner’s works of art as one of five sources for a hypothesis or a focus question.
detail: J.M.W. Turner, A Disaster at Sea, c.1835. © Tate, 2013
Curriculum-focused learning programs for early years to senior
students and for teachers are created and managed by Mark Fischer,
a specialist DECD teacher based at the Art Gallery of South Australia.