A Shipwreck, Philip James de Loutherbourg

Exhibition Label:
"Corpus," Apr-2012, Kris Ercums
In this painting, nothing is staid. A surging wave bends and breaks in the center of the painting, almost as if it were a hand reaching out to scoop the shipwrecked men from the tenuous safety of a rocky outcrop. The struggle between humankind and nature assumes a religious overtone when we recognize the gesture of the man in the center, who grips his hands above his head in a desperate prayer for salvation. Dramatic shipwreck scenes like this one helped de Loutherbourg establish his career in France, but he is best remembered as one of the fathers of English stage design. His career-long fascination with the theatrical potential of light, motion, and catastrophe were realized on an extreme scale in 1781, when he built the Eidophusikon: a painting in four dimensions that incorporated mechanically rotating sets, varied lighting, smoke, and musical accompaniment to emulate shipwrecks and other natural spectacles.

Archive Label 1999:
In 1766 de Loutherbourg was nominated painter to King Louis XV. In the following years, he became the most prolific French artist to exhibit at the Salon, where his works were well-received by the public and critics.

De Loutherbourg's work epitomizes eighteenth-century European romanticism. In A Shipwreck, he explores a popular romantic theme, humankind's struggle against the cruel forces of nature. Intense human emotions are symbolized by nature's fury: the diagonal onslaught of wind and rain, the surf crashing against the coast, and the bursts of sunlight that contrast with dark storm clouds. Inspired by works of French artist Claude Vernet, the foremost painter of shipwreck scenes, de Loutherbourg depicted this subject frequently between 1768 and 1771.