Summary

J. M. W. Turner: Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway
Artist	J. M. W. Turner  (1775–1851)      Alternative names J. M. W. Turner Description British painter and printmaker Date of birth/death circa 23 April 1775  19 December 1851  Location of birth/death London Chelsea Work location London, Britain, Italy, Germany, Switzerland Authority file : Q159758 VIAF: 100900492 ISNI: 0000000121454990 ULAN: 500026846 LCCN: n79060712 NLA: 35751158 WorldCat artist QS:P170,Q159758
Title	Rain, Steam and Speed - The Great Western Railway; the painting depicts an early locomotive of the Great Western Railway crossing the River Thames on Brunel's recently completed Maidenhead Railway Bridge.The painting is also credited for allowing a glimpse of the Romantic strife within Turner and his contemporaries over the issue of the technological advancement during the Industrial Revolution (see below).
Object type	painting
Date	1844 date QS:P571,+1844-00-00T00:00:00Z/9
Medium	oil on canvas medium QS:P186,Q296955;P186,Q12321255,P518,Q861259
Dimensions	height: 91 cm (35.8 in); width: 121.8 cm (47.9 in) dimensions QS:P2048,91U174728 dimensions QS:P2049,121.8U174728
Collection	National Gallery    Native name National Gallery Parent institution Board of Trustees of the National Gallery  Location London Coordinates 51° 30′ 32″ N, 0° 07′ 42″ W   Established 1824  Website nationalgallery.org.uk Authority file : Q180788 VIAF: 144868906 ISNI: 0000000123422001 ULAN: 500125190 LCCN: n80081622 NLA: 35311349 WorldCat institution QS:P195,Q180788
Current location	room 34
Accession number	NG538
Credit line	Turner Bequest, 1856
References	http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/joseph-mallord-william-turner-rain-steam-and-speed-the-great-western-railway  https://www.wga.hu/html/t/turner/2/205turne.html Art UK artwork ID: rain-steam-and-speed-the-great-western-railway-115073
Source/Photographer	http://www.artrenewal.org/pages/artwork.php?artworkid=14508&size=huge
Other versions	image  image with frame

Social Commentary

Turner was a well traveled man, frequently trekking to natural wonders of mainland Europe and the British Isles to sketch them in one of his dozens of notepads. He knew of the pains one must take to travel off the beaten path and wrote of one such occasion, traveling from Rome to Paris, to a friend in 1829:

“…we never could keep warm or make our day’s distance good, the places we put up at proved all bad till Firenzola being even the worst for the down diligence people had devoured everything eatable (Beds none)…crossed Mont Cenis on a sledge – bivouaced in the snow with fire lighted for 3 Hours on Mont Tarate while the diligence was righted and dug out, for a Bank of Snow saved it from upsetting – and in the walk up to our knees in new fallen drift to get assistance to dig a channel thro’ it for the coach, so that from Foligno to within 20 miles of Paris I never saw the road but snow!”1

Fifteen years later, Turner’s 1844 masterpiece, Rain, Steam and Speed: The Great Western Railway, in a way recognizes his thrill in the speed of the new coal train and his appreciation for such technology when traveling. Yet, he subtly recognizes the progressive threat that humans pose towards the cradle of the earth.

The title follows the Turner pattern of 'nature first' in his titles, but at once you see what looks like a monstrous kiln underneath the rail bridge, and flames engulfing the ecstatic figures on the far side of the river. On top of the bridge you see the face of a demon with the body of a coal burning centipede, which itself looks like a line of glowing embers. Ahead of the train it is hard to spot the tiny hare at full sprint, trying to stay ahead of the state-of-the-art technology of the mid-1800’s. What is so interesting about this piece, Olivier Meslay points out in his book JMW Turner: The Man Who Set Painting on Fire, is that “the notion of the sublime was no longer confined to natural phenomena, but incarnated in machines created by humanity with god-like aspirations, whose new power it served to magnify” and begs to question; what should we fear more, the awe of the wild, or the annihilation of it?2

1. Meslay, Olivier. JMW Turner: The Man Who Set Painting On Fire. London: Thames & Hudson Ltd, 2005. Pg 133

2. Ibid. Pg 107

Licensing

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This is a faithful photographic reproduction of a two-dimensional, public domain work of art. The work of art itself is in the public domain for the following reason: Public domainPublic domainfalsefalse This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published (or registered with the U.S. Copyright Office) before January 1, 1929. Public domain works must be out of copyright in both the United States and in the source country of the work in order to be hosted on the Commons. If the work is not a U.S. work, the file must have an additional copyright tag indicating the copyright status in the source country. Note: This tag should not be used for sound recordings.PD-1923Public domain in the United States//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rain_Steam_and_Speed_the_Great_Western_Railway.jpg The official position taken by the Wikimedia Foundation is that "faithful reproductions of two-dimensional public domain works of art are public domain". This photographic reproduction is therefore also considered to be in the public domain in the United States. In other jurisdictions, re-use of this content may be restricted; see Reuse of PD-Art photographs for details.