As museums around the world celebrate the 250th birthday of JMW Turner, it's time to reappraise his beloved and celebrated painting, The Fighting Temeraire.
JMW Turner’s The Fighting Temeraire became a national celebrity when it was first unveiled in 1839, and its fame has endured to the present day. But the widely accepted interpretation of this iconic painting’s message might, in fact, contradict Turner’s true intentions.
The “Temeraire” of the title refers to a 98-gun warship of the British Navy, which is depicted in the painting’s background. It was a hero in Britain’s defence against France during the Napoleonic Wars, but it caught the nation’s attention in 1838 when it was dismantled and its parts sold off. Turner’s painting depicts this once-mighty gladiator of the seas being towed down a burnished River Thames by a much more recently invented steam-powered tugboat.
