Description of the picture:
The Fearless Frigate is Joseph Mallord William Turner. 1839. Oil on canvas. 90.7×121.6
Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851) – British painter. The full author’s name of the painting is “Frigate Fearless: towed to its last parking lot to be destroyed. 1839“. It says not so much about the painter’s intention to create a finished work, but about the desire to leave documentary evidence of farewell to the legendary ship, which played an important role in the victorious Battle of Trafalgar, in which the English fleet proved its superiority over the Franco-Spanish, after which Napoleon abandoned claims to the sea .
In the battle of October 21, 1805, Admiral Horatio Nelson was mortally wounded. In 1806, Turner painted on this subject (the ship was “Victoria”). In the presented painting, after more than 30 years, the artist says goodbye to the other legendary British Navy frigate – “Fearless”. The master regarded him as an animated being. John Ruskin, who wrote the book “Harbors of England” in 1856, remarked about Turner’s paintings that the ship becomes a noble topic of painting when it crashes or collapses, that is, it embodies the symbol of human destiny.
The painter was already over 60, by this age he was unsurpassed in mastery of the transmission of water and air elements. The viewer almost physically senses the sea depicted in his paintings."