Peace – Peace Burial at sea J.M.W Turner

Peace Burial at Sea

Context

As written in an earlier blog, “Peace is generally the opposite of war, a state of harmony or the absence of hostility”. It is a state of harmonious relations with the absence of mental stress or anxiety.

Actual Meaning

Tuner was discovered at an early age due to his unusual artistic talents, it took 60 years of working on paintings, sketches and drawings to perfect his own, unique style. Certain characteristics of Turner’s work include: brightness, reflection, intensity and power of elemental forces. Although I could not find the actual meaning of this piece the information I found on Turner’s techniques and the quote below can give us an idea of what he meant to portray to the viewer and how he did this.

"I did not paint it to be understood but I wished to show what such a scene was like."

What the piece means to me

This image is titled ‘Peace burial at sea’ which describes the nature of the scene somewhat. My view is that the piece is showing the aftermath of a battle with the burning shipwreck in the foreground. I think the dark colours of the wreck in contrast to the white ships in the background are really effective because white is a colour usually associated with peace and thus adds more meaning and depth to the painting as a whole. The water is flat in the image and this also helps to create the feeling of peace and in my opinion the reflection of the fire and smoke from the wreck on the water draws this meaning into the whole piece. The light colours of the right side of the sky could be seen to symbolize new beginnings and the end of conflict.

Materials used and how they compliment the meaning

Although I can’t find and information on the painting I believe it’s created using oil paints on canvas. Turner had very strong feelings on colours and how to use them in his work, in his copy of 'Theory of Color' on the page where Goethe said, "If the totality of color is presented to the eye from the outside in the form of an object, it will be pleasing to the eye, because it thereby encounters the sum of its own activity as reality." Turner wrote in the margin: "This is the object of Painting”. Over the years of practice Turner develop a very definite style of brush work full of free weaving colours and light and I think this is the key feature of the work above and I feel that is why it appears so peaceful.

Overall Judgement

Overall I feel this peace is good example of symbolism in artwork by the use of colours and techniques to create the feeling of peace and tranquillity.

My Response

Here is my response to the image by J.M.W Turner, titled ‘Peace Burial at Sea’, I wanted to focus on the dark pastel colours used in the water and brighter sunlight to convey the feeling of peace. First of all I found a striking image of a sunset with a strong light emitting from sun sending bright colours across the rest of the composition. I then cut out the silhouettes of sailboats and made one black and set it in the foreground and the rest white set back onto the horizon, this to symbolise the idea of calm after a storm by using colours to represent meaning and enhance the idea of peace. I added a black fill layer over the top of the sunset image to darken some of the areas but I used the multiply tool which means the sunlight is still quite vivid, just like in Turner’s work. Overall I feel the image would look better with more layers or by using a more natural media like chalk pastels because although the colours are a good representative of Turner’s work because the image was created on the computer I was unable to create such texture like his. (All the computer manipulation was done using Photoshop).