The First Generation of British Romantics: William Blake (1757-1827) and His Contemporaries

William Blake, The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed in the Sun, from The Book of Revelation, 1806-09

"And behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads. And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth." -Revelation 12:3-4 - St. John wrote book of revelation. - bizarre image-based from the book of the revelation. - his original works are watercolors, then he etches them. Then hand-colors them. - Etchings > handcolor in watercolor

John Martin, The Great Day of His Wrath, 1851-53

- "I'm going to end you" - enormous borders - huge waterfall at the left - erupting. bought up by god's wrath. - Pictorialization of god's wrath - inspired Christian theory.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, San Giorgio Maggiore at Dawn, 1819

- (looks much darker and cooler) - he keeps doing these paintings - not as topographical as before, more mood and atmosphere - loves to go to venice a lot bc he likes water, skyline, light, reflections

Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons, 1834

- 1834, the house of parliament burn down. He actually lived in the london so he witnessed it. - He loved it because of all the texture and smoke in the atmosphere. He didn't felt bad. - confrontational between man-made architecture vs nature - loves nature, climate, light

James Barry, The Education of Achilles, 1772

- A lots of early romanticism in late 18th is very similar to the neoclassicism. similar subjects - lighting and drama differs from the neoclassicism.

John Henri Fuseli, Silence, 1799-1801

- Allegory of the silence. The single character representing something. - Nothing to do with the intellect in fact the way he paints her makes you feel sad, lonely, pity her. - Her world is kind of silent because she is not talking to anyone. - fold up in herself. - Most allegorical figures are females.

John Constable, Wivenhoe Park, Essex, 1816

- Arcadian comes from the shepherd ancient greece. Gods took care of them and had perfect world for their pets. - Arcadian talks about simple life with no burdens. Pagan eden. Paradise. - obv not paradise, and it is a real place. However, it gives feeling of Arcadia. IDEALIC (similar to ideal but not perfect). - These are real places. - Animals grazing, birds flying, nothing threatening, even though there is a storm it is dissipated.

John Henri Fuseli, The Nightmare, 1790-91

- Fuseli's Nightmare was very popular and people loved it. A few years later, he got a commission to do another Nightmare. - oriented toward vertical, narrower - Almost a mirror image of the nightmare - He redid the demon who is now looking down at her. - looking down at her - more monochromatic than the other one. Almost like a sepia painting. - exaggerates the anatomy of the woman as if she is the missing the abdomen which is part of the romanticism exaggerating things. - Pretty powerful image

William Gilpin, Plate from Three Essays: On Picturesque Beauty, On Picturesque Travel and On Picturesque Sketching, 1792

- Gilpin would take landscape elements very simply sketched in his sketchbook where he saw it in person. Then he goes back and start rendering forms and create watercolor. - he showed a different pages on his manual that how he can go to the nature and follow these steps to create satisfying watercolors - lots of images are in pencil sketches and he rendered in black and white

Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Fifth Plague of Egypt, 1800

- John Martin was an apocalyptic artist in England with large painting and incredibly powerful looking skies and drama. - Turner had a big impact on John Martin. He was England's foremost landscape topographical painter (Paint what he sees, no emotion) watercolor painting, and he didn't enjoy it so much. He wanted to pour his emotions and about countryside, history, stories and experience. It became more emotional in his painting which started with his biblical stories. Going away from the traditional interpretation of any imagery. - "expressionistic" meaning paint with emotions. Big brush stokes, lots of the bright colors

William Blake, King Nebuchadnezzar, 1795

- Nebuchadnezzar was a successor to the king Cyrus of Babylonia. Cryus was very benevolent and he actually gave rights to the ppl to travel wherever they want to go. Nebuchadnezzar was an oppressor of the Jews and cursed that he will crawl with 4. - Pose of animal.

Jacques-Louis David, The Oath of the Horattii, 1784

- No emotion on their faces even though they should have one - rococo women wimping - macho soldiers without emotions - vacuum almost no air. Sucks out of humanity.

John Martin, Pandemonium, 1841

- Pandemonium meaning complete chaos. - allegorical painting - volcanic river. Sky. Big lightening bolt. Not too realistic city - guy on the right is rebelling in the destruction. - romanesque looking because of all the columns, three layers of columns - combining different architectural styles = chaotic. - Greeks hate it because of they like order. Maybe it is a comment on contemporary architecture? Pure panic

James Barry, Self-Portrait, 1786

- Romantic painting could be as simple as evoking emotion. - He poses by he is holding up his canvas and painting. Classical painting which refers back to the Greek/renaissance period. Statue is prob the Laocoon statue. - He as a character tells you that he is not happy. Lots of Romanticism is about suffering and human tragedy. Who's life is always happy? no one. Tragedy is part of the human life and romanticism looks at them. It delves into real ppl and real feelings. Big part of the romanticism is the imagination. Revery=daydreaming. Many romantic art works shows ppl in revery. He seems to be sad which is part of the human experience. - Very educated. He knows his predecessors by few little snippets of his paintings. - His body language shows how he is not satisfied with his life. - def not neoclassical.

William Gilpin, Penrith Castle, Cumbria, England, 1786

- Romanticism are first and foremost emotional. Even the artist are landscape painter, he will paint something that is personal to him. It is not meant to be universal. Although it could be universal. - Some ppl might went to the same castle, but the way he paints with the mood, atmosphere, lighting, and the color are all personal experience of Gilpin. - He was a minister, so you can almost say it was a spiritual experience of Gilpin - watercolor

John Martin, The Destruction of Babylon, 1818-19

- Some of his artworks are lost. We only have the engraved productions of it. - In 7th century BCE, Babylonian attacked Israel and burn down the Sultan's temple. They took the Jews to the exile to Babylonia. - It is very heart wrenching incident where ppl were taken out of their home land and don't return for 200 yrs. - illustrating the emotional effect of the exile and destruction. Sky opening up for the god's rage. - biblical things on a biblical scale

John Henri Fuseli, Thor Battering the Midgard Serpent, 1790

- Sometimes how they portray something reveals who they are. - One thing that romantics like to do is to exaggerate things. More dramatic by using foreshortening. - There wasn't much real foreshortening in Neoclassicism. It's either profile or facing forward like a renaissance. - In Romanticism, it's all about the drama of the scene, so it shows foreshortening. - Romantics evokes emotion, emotional whereas Neoclassicism inspires ideas.

Nature and History in English Romantic Painting: William Gilpin (1724-1804)

- When Romantics deal with the historic event, it's similar in approaching historical event, but they approach it with emotion. - 2nd generation of the English painters is romantic landscape paintings. It went from figure to landscape. - Markers that it is moving toward landscape is shown through an essay Sublime and the beautiful by Edmund Burke. Irish representative in the Brit parliament who was a big supporter of the American Independence. - When Burke was 19, he was up in north England visiting a friend and got caught in a big storm. He was on a mountain and almost died. This near-death experience made him realizes his own mortality. Nature was the vehicle that let him to his understanding that he is not immortal. It changed his mind about the nature not just about himself. - In England, there was Christian theory that the anger of God during Adam and eve time was shown in big boulders, canyon, river beds..so everyone believed that the landscape was a bad thing. It is ugly and obstacle. There was nothing redeeming about the landscape. Burke's essay changed everyone's mind and galvanized ppl. It had an impact on ppl and now they are looking at nature differently. It really gave eyes to the entire generation and ppl strictly focused on the landscape in art. - One person who was really influenced by Burke's essay was this minister, Willian Gilpin. He was an amateur watercolorist. He set out to walk around the countryside and bring a sketchbook with him to do sketches of nature and formulating his ideas about how to write down everything for ppl who is going to read his book. When he came back to the studio, he did the painting. He realized that the sublime is the extreme human experience. - Anything that is awesome or awe-inspiring it is sublime, takes your breath away, huge, extreme, near-death experience, often pessimistic, creates extreme emotion (goya's person eating another person). In 18th and 19th centuries, you can't create sublime. It has to be an accident from nature. - quiet sublime: so intensely quiet. - Gilpin is PICTURESQUE. The average between sublime and beautiful and has aspects of both. Go out to nature and look for rivers. He even wrote an essay about picturesque too which was based on Burke's essay. - beautiful is not in nature. Edenic. too perfect - nowadays, you can make a sublime experience like Bungy jumping, car racing, etc - Romantics paint stuffs that are personal to them. Universal, it can be but not meant to be. - Romantics are existential. They actually do it! Not just talk about it.

James Northcote, John Henri Fuseli, 1778

- a swiss immigrant who comes to England who hoping to study at British royal academy under the Reynolds. When he got there, he realizes that it is too restrictive. - He decided to break out as his own and had his own style of paintings. He was an already a professional painter. - he thought he could learn more by going to the royal academy but he broke out of the zone. He starts to paint for himself

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Carlisle, 1797

- all watercolor - qualitative: darker, has more atmosphere - not as topographical. Has more emotion, evolving to romantic. - Painting what he FEELS not just what he SEES. What you feel is personal which is romantic, what you see is topographical - painterly, using more water. Painting more than just coloring drawings which is a step to become a pure painter

James Barry, Satan and His Legions Hurling Defiance Toward the Vault of Heaven, 1792-94

- anything that is dramatic - neoclassicism is theatrical but it doesn't mean it is visually dramatic. Romantics like those contrasts like Baroque period. Contrast in dark and light

John Martin (1789-1854): Visions of the Apocalypse

- apocalypse meaning ppl are suffering. His art reflects the suffering. Turner is not apocalyptic artist - ABOSULATELY SUBLIME - the same when we have Constable painting mostly optimistic paintings (picturesque is generally optimistic / sublime is often pessimistic) - 19th century is different from the 18th century in that photography > see more > experience more > understand the world more. Open up the society to advance more - 19th century was the age of TECHNOLOGY! Humanity starts to become minimized. Factories > ppl work in factories > less individuality> less humanity > less faith > more sin > apocalypse - the last time when we had apocalypse was when we had a plague. Protestant Reformation. Vatican's whole philosophy was going to heaven if you follow the rule, if not you go to hell. - Book of revelation became popular which is all about apocalypse. - Bible's Old testment is his fav subject matter because it is full of punishment and god's wrath

John Martin, Joshua Commanding the Sun to Stand Still Upon Gibeon, 1816

- apocalyptic in nature - there are many stories in the bible where Israelites come to the Cain after 40 years of dessert. There's a lot of about death and destruction. Violent. God's orders to get rid of all the ppl. - John martin is taking a story from the bible showing Joshua is holding his arms up in the foreground which would make walls fall down. Jews would be triumph of the enemy when the arms are up and vice versa. The way of keeping the energy flowed between God and the ppl. - Joshua in the foreground with everyone else is kind of standing around him. - army going in to the town - sublime, extreme images

William Blake, from The Argument, from The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Plate 21, 1790

- bizarre. He didn't really study human anatomy. He just studied ancient books. - If you don't understand, you can't do it accurately - weird proportions

Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1771

- both are very stagey. Theatrical. - strong primary colors - NO ATMOSPHERE in neoclassicism. Atmosphere creates MOOD. Contrived emotions, not real emotion.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Cathedral Church at Lincoln, 1795

- brit loved visiting their famous churches - successful bc he is catering to brit tourist industry - still functioning cathedral. - tightly rendered

John Constable, Salisbury Cathedral from Lower March Close, 1820

- close is like a meadow - British gothic architecture is not the same as French gothic or Italian. They usually have long buildings with bell towers at the center instead of the end.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Inside Tintern Abbey, 1794

- commercial illustrator at first - topographical. - He wasn't yet a full blown romantic. He was very successful though. - Constable was a homebody vs Turner was an opposite. He constantly traveled to Europe and Venice. He loved going on to the ocean and Mediterranean. - turner lifestyle and perspective of art in general evolved as he traveled. He starts like Martin - Constable was constant lol. Always the same.

William Blake, The Laocoön, ca. 1820

- copies some famous pieces like laocoon - wrote hebrew passages around it

John Constable, Salisbury Cathedral and Leadenhall from the River Avon, 1820

- different color palettes to create different moods - almost looks like a abstract painting from the 20th century if you look at the small spots. Then if you pul back it looks realistic - his painting style is very much painterly not drawing

John Constable, Stonehenge, 1835

- dramatic

James Barry, King Lear Weeping over the Dead Body of Cordelia, 1786-87

- from shakespeare - literally sources of neoclassicism is very confined: bible, history, myth - Romanticism is more board to lit ex) dante, shakespeare. They love stories that are full of action, emotion, tragedy, triumph. - Play is very emotional and universally understood. - more emotion than the neoclassicism. - ATMOSPHERE

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Venice—The Dogana and San Giorgio Maggiore, 1834

- he can be very luminescent - Venice affected him in someway, he didn't any passionate paintings in Vencie - he had a good skill of draftsmanship. - nothing to do with painting.

Salisbury Cathedral

- he did a seres on a famous brit gothic cathedral - Salisbury Cathedral was not far away from where Constable lives. He was a friend with abbot (head priest) of Salisbury Cathedral complex. - At one point, the abbot suggested him to paint cathedral. He begun painting lots of landscapes and buildings so he said sure and start painting large number of the series.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Snow Storm—Steam Boat off a Harbor's Mouth Making Signals in Shallow Water, before 1843

- he more the progresses, it becomes more and more abstract

John Constable, Golding Constasble's Flower Garden, 1815

- his father's flower garden - if you took a close up view of constable's paintings, take a little frame from the painting itself. Out of context, it will show the act of the painting - very abstract as a painter even though overall pic is realistic - why is it romantic? not didactic, PICTURESQUE, gives mood - picturesque = sublime (clouds) + beautiful (edenic landscape)

John Constable, Golding Constable's Kitchen Garden, 1815

- his house - place where he painted his whole life - if you pull back about 100 yards, it is basically the same place - Romantics do series of the paintings of the same thing at the same exact spot under different atmosphere, palette, and conditions. Impressionism followed that but different colors not different moods. - magnificent sky and gorgeous water

John Constable, The Haywain, 1821

- his most famous art work - Picturesque picture - storm was raging but they are going to left. Beautiful sky opening up, stream is reflecting, puffy clouds, dog in the foreground, butterflies and birds - Haywain is the wagon that goes on to the field and carries the hay to sell at the market. Slow and easy. Nothing threatening or dangerous. - One time when he left England, he went to france. The one that got most of the attention was the Haywain. - This painting had an influenced Delacroix. In 1824, he went to the exhibition in the Louvre, and he went there with one of his own paintings. When he saw how Constable painted the sky, he took off his painting off from the wall and went back to the studio. He completely repainted the sky and rehung it in the Louvre. - Cole was familiar with Constable's painting and he also created most of picturesque imagery and emulated his style - picturesque is most human one because you can experience in it and often has human in it

Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Fighting Temeraire Being towed to its Final Berth to be Broken Up, ca. 1839

- huge battleship in the background - industrial revolution is becoming the full blown in the western world - steamship is towing a sailing ship. end of the era. - turner feels the important moment of the history - England's pride started to occupy territory 1/4 of the earth. They had to change their focus to maintain their empire, so they colonize the globe. It had 99 years of colonization of Hongkong and occupied India. - he said he saw ship changing from sailing to steams. It is a big change. Past world to the modern world.

Thomas Philips, William Blake, 1807

- isolated himself from the rest of the world on purpose because he wanted to invent himself. He refused to go to study under someone or go museum. Don't want to corrupt his unspoiled, innocent view and fresh view of the world. The only place he went to was national library in London where it shows all reproduced renaissance artworks. - his figures looks forced because he learned anatomy from the library - poet, and made his own paper, book, engraved, painted....did everything by himself. - someone visited him announced and saw him and his wife acting like adam and eve.

John Martin, The Seventh Plague of Egypt, 1823

- lots of biblical subject. All to do with God and sky, sublime, monumental size of god and his power. Insignificant ppl. - Moses and Aaron are vehicle of implementing the plan of the Egypt

John Martin, Belshazzar's Feast, engraving after Martin's painting, 1821

- many of his artworks were made into engraving for mass production because ppl can't buy it for $$$. - following english tradition of making engraving set by West and Copley. They exhibited them in a gallery and charged admission.

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Snow Storm: Hannibal and His Army Crossing the Alps, 1812

- most important thing is the storm. Micro ppl in the bottom. - Hannibal was threatened by romans. Rome wanted to control the whole north africa. Hannibal was a great strategist, but couldn't compete with roman power and money. Hannibal wanted to give a good one blow to Rome. He took his army and elephants. Roma was coming from Sicily, he went up and came over the alps. They defeated the romans, but Roman obliterated them later. - actual experience - When Turner was visiting friend in the north england, a huge storm hit them. They got home drenched, but didn't die. He said he will paint this in the future - emotional monumental image - becomes what is Turner's mature style. - The act of painting >>>> story - oil painting but looks like watercolor. Soft and bleeding. - expressionist. Great deal of emotions - he would take off paints from canvas with rag to make an effect that he likes. Almost destroys the canvas for the effect.

John Martin, The Bard, 1817

- mostly sublime images - scale! Ppl are tiny relative to the rest of the nature in the sublime images - bright color - river

John Martin, The Eve of the Deluge, 1840

- optimistic sometimes - but story is pessimistic - the day before the flood hits the earth - the sky is falling down top left - uplighting and bright colors make it look like optimistic and draws you in

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Rain, Steam and Speed: The Great Western Railway, 1844

- peripatetic (loves to travel) - based on his experience about how he likes to travel - They built a new bridge across the London bridge at the thames river. The rich guy in AZ wanted the London bridge, so he bought it from the city of the london. He took it apart and transported to AZ. - turner got on the train and while they are crossing the river, huge storm blasted the train. He wanted to experience the speed of the train and weather that was hitting the train. He stuck his head out for 9 mins. - brown blob = rabbit running away from the train. The train is coming toward us meaning the future. He sees future is technological. Cole was trying to slow down the progress. It doesn't bother Turner and painting what he observed. Technology is affecting everybody's life. Existential experience - very uneducated, but brilliant and profound as a person.

John Constable, Hadleigh Castle, Mouth of the Thames—Morning After a Stormy Night, 1829

- picturesque because it is after storm

John Constable (1776-1837)

- popular philosophy: sublime, beautiful, and picturesque. This is what was in ppl's conscience in American and England. - Constable was one of the England premiere landscape painter, member of the loyal academy, homebody, born and lived, married, and died in the same house (Sussex area), painted for his whole life - the only time he left England was before he went to Paris to exhibit at Louvre for annual exhibition - he loves sunlight, shadow, atmosphere, clouds - Constable used to do skying meaning goes out with paint brush and an easel and look at the different clouds forms all day long. - Some ppl who are a meteorologist they said he was better than them because he observed clouds movement and formation because he was looking at it all day. - PICTURESQUE artist

John Henri Fuseli, Titania and Oberon, from Shakespeare's A Mid-Summer Night's Dream, 1788

- pure fantasy - from Shakespeare - neoclassicism only uses 3 resources which are myth, bible, history. - tightly rendered, subject matter, looks like neoclassical art, anatomically well done, great composition, but nothing to do with neoclassicism - Fuseli was trained to be an academic painter, but he is a Romantic painter. He has academic skills, but he doesn't practice academic art. - Fuseli came from England to Switzerland to study at the royal academy. Then he realized it was too conservative for them, so he left the academy. He became an independent artist because he wanted to paint fantasy like a nightmare.

John Constable, Dedham Vale, 1828

- same area at Sussex - contrast and being dramatic - Chiaroscuro. Dramatic lighting to make illusion of 3d form. 3d space. Not many ppl did that before Constable. - Thomas Cole learned chiaroscuro from Constable - Turner didn't much use chiaroscuro but used different kind of emphasis

Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Fifth Plague of Egypt, 1800

- stylistic connection to John Martin. - He was good at creating dramatic monumental paintings. - If you hide the top and just look at the bottom, that's what he will become as a painter. Not so clear details, Expressionistic (not deliberate, painting with emotion and physically) not true in here, but becomes true in future - He is interested in the story of fifth plague of the egypt and showing ppl ad building. There are a setting and location.

John Constable, Salisbury Cathedral from the Meadows, 1829-31

- the most dramatic one - This was painted between 1829-31 which was the time when his wife was dying in their house. He very devoted to his wife and had a hard time dealing with her illness and death. - When she died, he couldn't figure out how to finish the paint because she was too emotionally raw. - subdued dark colors - almost a sublime painting - devoted christian - God created a rainbow to promise to man that he will never do it again. Symbolize hope. He felt hopeless and pessimistic, but he realized that his life was so rich with her in his life. Rainbow symbolize that he is completely moved on from his wife's death and doesn't dwell on it.

William Blake, The Ancient of Days, 1794

- too many muscles, too short legs - not accurate but visually powerful image

John Henri Fuseli, The Nightmare, 1781

- true romantic because he is dealing with things that neoclassical never deal with like self-conscience. Neoclassical art deals with surface things, political, intellectual, greek/roman subject matter. Fuseli want to delve into the self conscience - exaggerates anatomy - demon sucking the soul out - shadows casted into the curtain - horse is a "night-mare" - she seems to be never able to wake up for eternity. - romantics use color more. Romanticism do like drama as in theatrical drama. Romantics like imagination, fantasy

Joseph Mallord William Turner, Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying—Typhoon Coming On, a.k.a. The Slave Ship, 1840

- turner liked current events, but they weren't portrayed with didactic in mind. Usually about the human tragedy - he read about this slave ship incident just like Jericho read the raft of medusa on the newspaper. - in the early 19th century, they outlawed the slavery in the brit soil, but it didn't stop the slave trade. A slave ship that just picked up a human cargo from africa and going to trade them for local goods like sugar cane, spices, raw materials. Triangle trade. Slaves were suffering from contagious deadly disease without captain's knowledge. They dropped them in the ocean because he can't lose his crew. - shackled hands connected together. Drowning. - boiling bunch of red water because sharks following the ship. - expressionist. Painting emotionally and physically - He picks the color symbolically. The most important color in this painting is red and orange. Focus of the cool color is around the ship. Red=anger, extreme emotions, outrage, violence. Blue = cold hearted captain. - SUBLIME

William Blake, frontispiece, Visions of the Daughters of Albion, 1793

- unusual, unique look of them - women are shackled, hand in their back, donut like man. Blake didn't have an understanding of how body parts fit together correctly - still strong images

William Blake, Glad Day or The Dance of Albion, 1794

- using Leonardo da Vinci, The Vitruvian Man, 1492 as a pose

William Blake, The Whirlwind of Lovers, from Dante's Inferno, 1827

- very popular book to illustrate

John Constable, Old Sarum, 1832

- watercolor

John Martin, Belshazzar's Feast, 1820

- writings on the wall means showing what's going to happen in the future. - Belshazzar was a king of the Babylon when Daniel was thrown into the lion's den. Daniel was could tell the future and read signs. King kept having vision and couldn't interpret the word on the wall. So they took out Daniel from the jail and bought him to show the writings on the wall. We still don't know what it means....We can read them, but no one doesn't know the meaning.

The First Generation of British Romantics: William Blake (1757-1827) and His Contemporaries

Romanticism characteristics - not didactic - often very narrative - DEEP emotion - mostly romantic artists use thick paint "PAINTERLY" (others linear painting-no brush work is visible) - you feel the presence of the artist because of the texture - COLORS are important - Neoclassical use primary colors whereas romantics like to use whatever color they want to use - neoclassicism looks like renaissance, romantic looks like Baroque - Neoclassical art don't deal with fantasy, no Shakespearean, only use Bible, Greek myth, and history. Intellects, politics, ideas, and didactic imagery. - human tragedy - 1st gen Brit romantic: figural artist, mythology, biblical subjects