Maritime Art Archive
A Fishing Boat in Rough Sea off a Rocky Shore (1620s)
This vibrant depiction of a two-masted vessel in a rough sea, shows the craft caught in a narrow channel between rocks and a towering crag. Other shipping can be seen to the left and land to the right in the distance. A group of figures huddle together around a fire and two more stand on […] Read More
Taking in New Hay and stacking it, June 1774
In 1991 The Society for Nautical Research purchased an album of 73 sketches by Lieutenant Gabriel Bray and donated them to the National Maritime Museum. Bray served as a second lieutenant on the 38-gun HMS Pallas between December 1774 and September 1775. Read more about the Bray collection at the National Maritime Museum and see a […] Read More
Noah Building the Ark
Jan (Johannes) Sadeler (1550-1600) came from a talented and successful family of printmakers with an international reputation as their work circulated widely in Europe as well as the Spanish colonies. He began his working life as a damascener – a skilled steel-chiseller – but then moved to Antwerp where he joined the Guild of St […] Read More
Dutch ships in a breeze c.1650
The artist of this charming oil painting is unknown. The only clue to the painter’s identity is a log in the foreground, drifting in the sea, with the initials ‘DW’ painted in clear letters. The style of the painting is also no help to the artist’s identity; the artist appears to have been neither highly […] Read More
The Capture of the Spanish Silver Fleet Near Havana, 1628
In 1628 the Dutch and Spanish had already been at war, with the occasional truce, for sixty years. What initially had begun as a war for Dutch independence in northern Europe had by this stage spilled out into the Atlantic. During this period the Spanish empire funded itself with treasure mined in south America and […] Read More
The Battle of La Rochelle, 1372 (1804)
This early nineteenth-century coloured aquatint by J. Harris reproduces a key illustration from Jean Froissart’s Chronicles (1337-1410), one of the most important historical narrative sources we have for the fourteenth century. Froissart used a colourful and dramatic style to illustrate the events he recorded, all based on both historical and eyewitness sources. For maritime and […] Read More
Boats of the Boulogne Flotilla for the Invasion of England, 1803
‘A correct view of the French Flat-Bottom Boats intended to convey their troops for the invasion of England, as seen afloat in Charante Bay in August 1803 – these flat bottom boats are about 120 feet long, and 40 broad and will carry 300 Men each, they have on board 4 small boats, calculated to […] Read More
An English Ship in Action with Barbary Corsairs, circa 1680
This magnificent painting of a mid-seventeenth century sea battle was painted by Willem van de Velde the Younger. It shows an action between an English two-decker and a Barbary two-decker, with several galleys also being depicted as well as the stern of another larger ship, wreathed in smoke to the right of the image. Beyond […] Read More
The China War 1857, a sunset sky, a round fort with pointed tower. (1857)
This is one of nine watercolours made during the Second Opium War (1856-60) by Thomas Goldsworthy Dutton. The British defeated the resistance of the Qing Dynasty, legalised the lucrative trade in opium and created a permanent diplomatic presence in China for Britain as well as France and Russia. A key moment in the war was […] Read More
A cow, lying down
In 1991 The Society for Nautical Research purchased an album of 73 sketches by Lieutenant Gabriel Bray and donated them to the National Maritime Museum. Bray served as a second lieutenant on the 38-gun HMS Pallas between December 1774 and September 1775. Read more about the Bray collection at the National Maritime Museum and see a […] Read More