When looking at the Background of this artwork, how do you discuss its J. M. W. Turner's Exhibition at The Royal Academy of Arts?
Exhibition at The Royal Academy of Arts In 1840, two important international anti-slavery conventions were held in London: "The General Anti-Slavery Society" and "Society of the Extinction of the Slave Trade and the Civilization of Africa." Turner's exhibition of The Slave Ship at the Royal Academy of Arts coincided with these conventions. This public display of a horrific event reminding viewers of Britain's past was intended to evoke an emotional response to the inhumane slave trade still occurring at that time in other parts of the world. Given the context of its initial exhibition, the painting would likely have been interpreted as a political call to action.When Turner exhibited this picture at the Royal Academy of Arts in 1840 he paired it with the following extract from his unfinished and unpublished poem Fallacies of Hope (1812):
"Aloft all hands, strike the top-masts and belay;
Yon angry setting sun and fierce-edged clouds
Declare the Typhon's coming.
Before it sweeps your decks, throw overboard
The dead and dying – ne'er heed their chains
Hope, Hope, fallacious Hope!
Where is thy market now?"
Royal Academy of Arts The Royal Academy of Arts