. English: A Fleet of Whalers Unlike de Vries’ portrayal of whaling (BHC0798), van Salm’s expedition takes place far away from any discernible land, exemplifying a different type of whaling practice known as pelagic whaling or sea fishing. A broad sky, in place of a coast, filled with impalpable patches of seemingly static clouds dominates the work. The sea, which comprises only about a third of the composition, gently ripples beneath several exquisitely rendered sailing vessels. On the left ice has formed into thick sheets which float gracelessly in the sea. The overall blanched appearance o
. English: A Fleet of Whalers Unlike de Vries’ portrayal of whaling (BHC0798), van Salm’s expedition takes place far away from any discernible land, exemplifying a different type of whaling practice known as pelagic whaling or sea fishing. A broad sky, in place of a coast, filled with impalpable patches of seemingly static clouds dominates the work. The sea, which comprises only about a third of the composition, gently ripples beneath several exquisitely rendered sailing vessels. On the left ice has formed into thick sheets which float gracelessly in the sea. The overall blanched appearance of this piece may allude to the reflective relationship between the ice and the sky commonly referred to by whalers as ‘ice-blink’. ‘Where the ice is fixed upon the sea,’ wrote the Dutch voyager Friedrich Martens in 1671, ‘you see a snow-white brightness in the skies, as if the sun shined; for the snow is reflected by the air, just as a fire by night is …’ Two colossal whales surface above the crisply delineated waves. The whale on the left is harpooned by a boat crew of Dutch whalers while, in the foreground, on the right, another expels a rigid jet of water into the air. Several other whales, each targeted by one or more boats, are pictured towards the horizon. Their awkward appearance is entirely at odds with the fastidious and accurate depiction of the shipping. Van Salm’s aptitude for penschilderij, the technique of drawing onto a prepared oil ground using a reed pen and Indian ink, has attracted comparisons with Willem van de Velde the Elder. Van de Velde was, most likely, the inventor of this particular technique (BHC0277 and BHC0280). By the end of the seventeenth century marine painters and their patrons had cultivated a taste for scenes depicting Dutch enterprises in far-off Arctic waters. This diminutive pen-painting illustrating a whaling fleet was doubtless produced as a means of celebrating the success and prosperity of the Dutch whaling industr
Size: 2714px × 1841px
Photo credit: © The Picture Art Collection / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords:
