Fine Canvas Art Blog

Bridge of Sighs, Ducal Palace and Custom House, William Turner

British / Italian / Landscape / Paintings (Reproductions) - 1 year ago - troycapc

This is a reproduction of “Bridge of Sighs, Ducal Palace and Custom House, Venice” of 1833 by William Turner.  When the artist exhibited this masterpiece in 1840 he accompanied it with these lines based on Byron’s Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage,

“I stood upon a bridge, a palace
and a prison on each hand.”

Byron had named the bridge based on the fact that Venetian prisoners would last glimpse the open world upon this bridge before being led into prison cells.  The painting was given to the British nation in 1856.  This masterpiece is 81.6 cm wide and 51.1 cm high and is in the Tate, London.

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Shipwreck of the Minotaur, J. M. William Turner, ca. 1810

British / Landscape / Paintings (Reproductions) / Turner - 1 year ago - troycapc

This is a reproduction of “The Shipwreck of the Minotaur” by J. M. William Turner of about 1810.  This British warship was sailing from Gothenburg to Britain when it was wrecked on the night of December 22, 1810.  Over a hundred of her crew reached the Dutch shore and twenty others were rescued by a pilot vessel.  Yet Dutch authorities refused to send help to the vessel which was being pounded to pieces.  Between 370 and 570 souls were lost and the 130 survivors were taken to France as prisoners of war.  Turner had been working on shipwreck paintings and this one was named to take advantage of the scandal among the British public over the failure of the Dutch to rescue hundreds of people who could have been saved.  This masterpiece is in the Calouste Gulenkian Museum in Lisbon.

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