Oil paint on canvas
Tate Britain
Tate Collection
Works with images
Works on display
Joseph Mallord William Turner
Turner Bequest
Oil paintings
Collection
Turner owned by Tate
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/joseph-mallord-william-turner-558" aria-label="More by Joseph Mallord William Turner" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Joseph Mallord William Turner</a>
Shipwreck
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
adults
boat, sailing
group
groups
man
people
sailor
sea
seascapes and coasts
shipwreck
society
storm
trading and commercial
transport: water
wave
weather
work and occupations
<p>Storms and shipwrecks were a popular theme when Turner painted this. Fishermen battle waves, attempting rescue of an overcrowded lifeboat. A capsized ship lies behind on the dark sea. Turner specialised in the maritime Sublime – dramatic scenes that powerfully conveyed the danger of life at sea. He does this here by placing us, the viewer, close to the drama. With no land in sight, it is as if we are out on the stormy sea, too. The painting may have been inspired by an 1804 edition of William Falconer’s poem, The Shipwreck, which was illustrated by elder marine painter Nicholas Pocock.</p><p><em>Gallery label, October 2023</em></p>
painting oil paint canvas
5 March 2001 – 23 June 2002
2002-06-23
5 March 2001 – 23 June 2002
2002-06-23
2001-03-05
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2001-03-05
Painting Landscape and History [TB CL2002]
Collection based display
25 April 2001 – 29 July 2001
2001-07-29
25 April 2001 – 30 July 2001
2001-07-30
2001-04-25
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2001-04-25
House and Studio
Collection based display
26 August 2002 – 18 July 2005
2005-07-18
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2002-08-26
Marine Painting
Collection based display
1 October 2007 – 21 September 2008
2008-09-21
1 October 2007 – 6 January 2008
2008-01-06
2007-10-01
National Gallery of Art (Washington DC, USA)
10 February 2008 – 18 May 2008
2008-05-18
2008-02-10
Dallas Museum of Art (Dallas, USA)
http://www.DallasMuseumofArt.org
23 June 2008 – 21 September 2008
2008-09-21
2008-06-23
Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, USA)
http://www.metmuseum.org
2007-10-01
JMW Turner
Tate partnerships & programmes
20 March 2009 – 10 August 2009
2009-08-10
20 March 2009
2009-03-20
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2009-03-20
Turner and Rothko Introduction
Collection based display
18 August 2009 – 14 November 2010
2010-11-14
18 August 2009 – 14 November 2010
2010-11-14
2009-08-18
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2009-08-18
Sublime
Collection based display
30 July 2010 – 15 April 2012
2012-04-15
30 July 2010 – 15 April 2012
2012-04-15
2010-07-30
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2010-07-30
Romantics
Collection based display
21 April 2012 – 1 March 2020
2020-03-01
21 April 2012 – 1 March 2020
2020-03-01
2012-04-21
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2012-04-21
Turner Exhibited
Collection based display
21 November 2013 – 1 September 2014
2014-09-01
21 November 2013 – 21 April 2014
2014-04-21
2013-11-21
National Maritime Museum (London, UK)
http://www.nmm.ac.uk
2013-11-21
Turner and Marine Painting: Imagining the Sea, 1796 - 1899
Loan-out
6 April 2020 – 27 November 2022
2022-11-27
6 April 2020
2020-04-06
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2020-04-06
Clore 107
Collection based display
13 March 2023
Tate Britain (London, UK)
http://www.tate.org.uk/britain/
2023-03-13
Gallery 106
Collection based display
The Shipwreck
support: 1705 × 2416 mm
frame: 2085 × 2795 × 235 mm
Accepted by the nation as part of the <a href="/search?gid=999999781" data-gtm-name="tombstone_link_bequest" data-gtm-destination="list-page--search-results">Turner Bequest</a> 1856
<div class="text">
<p>Storms and shipwrecks were a popular theme when Turner painted this. Fishermen battle waves, attempting rescue of an overcrowded lifeboat. A capsized ship lies behind on the dark sea. Turner specialised in the maritime Sublime – dramatic scenes that powerfully conveyed the danger of life at sea. He does this here by placing us, the viewer, close to the drama. With no land in sight, it is as if we are out on the stormy sea, too. The painting may have been inspired by an 1804 edition of William Falconer’s poem, The Shipwreck, which was illustrated by elder marine painter Nicholas Pocock.</p>
</div>

Display caption
2023-10-25T00:00:00
display-caption
DISPLAY_CAPTION
<p><b>54. </b>[<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/turner-the-shipwreck-n00476" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N00476</span></a>]<b> The Shipwreck Exh. 1805</b>
<br/>
<br/>THE TATE GALLERY, LONDON (476)
<br/>Canvas, 67 1/8 × 95 1/8 (170·5 × 241·5)</p>
<p><b>Coll.</b> Bought 1806 by Sir John Leicester, Bt; exchanged 1807 for <i>Fall of the Rhine at Schaffhausen</i> (No. 61); Turner Bequest 1856 (54, ‘Shipwreck’ 8'0" × 5'8 1/2"); transferred to the Tate Gallery 1910.</p>
<p><b>Exh.</b> Turner's gallery 1805; Tate Gallery 1931 (21); Tate Gallery 1959 (344, repr. pl. 47); R.A. 1974–5 (82).</p>
<p><b>Engr.</b> By Charles Turner in mezzotint in 1806, published 1 January 1807 (Rawlinson ii 1913, pp. 362–3 no. 751; repr. Wilton 1980, pl. 56); by T. Fielding in aquatint 1825.</p>
<p><b>Lit.</b> Ruskin 1857 (1903–12, xiii, pp. 107–13); Burnet 1852, p. 101 as ‘Fishing-Boats saving the Crew of a Wreck’, engr. as frontis.; Cunningham 1852, p. 13; Thornbury 1862, i, pp. 266–7, 410; 1877, pp. 193–4, 423–4; Hamerton 1879, p. 167; Monkhouse 1879, p. 50; Armstrong 1902, pp. 52–3, 231; Finberg 1910, pp. 49–51; Rawlinson ii 1913, p. 363; Whitley 1928, p. 106; Davies 1946, p. 186; Finberg 1961, pp. 116–19, 124–5, 134, 171, 467 no. 94, pl. 9; Hall 1962, pp. 93, 120; Kitson 1964, p. 18, repr. in colour p. 25; Rothenstein and Butlin 1964, p. 19, pl. 23; Lindsay 1966, pp. 90–91; Brill 1969, pp. 11–12, repr.; Gage 1969, pp. 40, 89; Reynolds 1969, pp. 60–62, 68, 75–6, pl. 42; Watson 1971, pp. 115–16, pl. 38; Adele M. Holcomb, ‘John Sell Cotman's <i>Dismasted Brig</i> and the Motif of the Drifting Boat’, <i>Studies in Romanticism</i> xiv 1975, pp. 34, 36–7, pl. 5; Gage 1980, pp. 25–6, 33; Wilton 1980, p. 46.</p>
<p></p>
<p>Purchased by Sir John Leicester Bt, for £315; the receipt is dated 31 January 1806. A note in Turner's hand of 9 February (?) 1807 at Tabley House records an agreement to take it back in exchange for <i>The Falls of the Rhine at Schaffhausen</i> (No. 61, <i>q.v.</i>): ‘The picture of the fall of the Rhine—to be Sir John Leicesters in Exchange for the Storm for 50 Guineas’. This was endorsed by Sir John Leicester, ‘Pd. Febr. 9[?] 1807 Mr. Turner 50 Gs. &amp; Storm in exchange for ye Rhine’.
<br/>
<br/>A possible stimulus to Turner's choice of subject was the highly successful republication in 1804, with illustrations by Nicholas Pocock, of William Falconer's poem <i>The Shipwreck</i>, first published in 1762. Cotman made a <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/w/watercolour" title="Glossary definition for 'Watercolour'"><span>watercolour</span></a> copy of the foremost boat, now in a private collection (repr. Holcomb <i>loc. cit.</i>, pl. 6).
<br/>
<br/>This picture was priced at £400 in a note, probably of <i>c.</i> 1810, in Turner's ‘Finance’ sketchbook (CXXII–36; for the date see Nos. 53 and 56, [<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/turner-the-destruction-of-sodom-n00474" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>N00474</span></a>]).
<br/>
<br/>There are <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/drawing" title="Glossary definition for 'Drawing'"><span>drawings</span></a> for the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/composition" title="Glossary definition for 'Composition'"><span>composition</span></a> in the ‘Calais Pier’ sketchbook (LXXXI–2, 6, 132–3, 136–7, 140–41) and slighter sketches, probably from actual wrecks, in the ‘Shipwreck No. 1’ sketchbook (LXXXVII–11, 16, repr. Kitson 1964, p. 41 and Reynolds 1969, pl. 41 respectively, as well as other sketches related in more general terms). This was the first of Turner's oil <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/p/painting" title="Glossary definition for 'Painting'"><span>paintings</span></a> to be <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/e/engraving" title="Glossary definition for 'Engraving'"><span>engraved</span></a>. The prospectus makes it clear that the picture could be seen in Turner's gallery ‘until July 1, 1805’.
<br/>
<br/>A small copy, 16 1/2 × 20 1/2 in., attributed to Eugene Isabey, was sold at Christie's, New York, on 24 January 1980 (17, repr.).</p>
<p>
<br/><b>Published in:</b>
<br/>Martin Butlin and Evelyn Joll, <i>The Paintings of J.M.W. Turner</i>, revised ed., New Haven and London 1984
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-09-22T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
adults boat, sailing group groups man people sailor sea seascapes and coasts shipwreck society storm trading and commercial transport: water wave weather work and occupations