9
SnowStorm:Hannibaland his Army Crossing
the Alps
Exhibited 1812.Canvas, 146xZ37.5 cm. Tare Gallery,
London
Though rurner had exhibited subjectsfrom classicar
history before,gnoa
storm: Hannibal and Hi' Army crossingtie Alps has a speciar
significancefor
a number of reasons.F or the first time a lengthy quotation
from
the artist,s
own manuscriprpoem 'The Fallaciesof Hope' appeared
in the Academy
catalogue;the subject matter, for which prevailingacademic
conventions
would normallyhavedemandeda more explicit use of figures,
reliesfor irs
force almosrentirely upon atmosphericefiect; allusion
to historicalfact is
relegatedto rape and pillage at rhe lower edge of the
canvasand the sil_
houetted elephantsin the distance;and with its concenrrared
vortex of
light and dark with the sun ar irs centre,the composition
is rhe most daring
yer arrempred by Turner. In this last respect rhe paindng
is a direct
descendantof rie wrecfrofa Transportsiip oic.1gr0 (prateg).
in its colouring and in the mannerin which the painiis apptiedro the
canvasthe work
looksforwardro what Turner himself calteahis 'indistinctness,a word he
applied to Staffa,Fingal,sCaoe,exhibited in lg3Z (Fig.1l) _
and
what
John
Constabletermed in 1836.tinted steam,so evanescent,and
so airy,.
The subject of Hannibal had been in Turner,s mind
fo*o_" y"u^
b:1"_* h: producedthe picture and he must undoubtedly
havebee.r#u."
of Napoleon'sfamouscrossingof rhe Alps, with thirty
thousandmen, in
1800.
10
FroscyMorning
Exhibited 1813.Canvas, 113.5x 174.5cm. Tate Gallery, London
Described by the son of one of Turner's oldest friends asamongthe artist's
favourite pictures, Fros4 Moming was apparently based upon a sketch
made while he was journeying in Yorkshire - the stage coach in which
Turner was travelling being shown approaching the spectator along the
road to the left. The simpliciry of the composition, the coolnessof the
colouring, the directnessof the observation,match exactly the single line
from Thomson's Autann, which was printed beneath the title of the painting in the Royal Academy catalogue:'The rigid hoar frost melts before his
beam.' It is a conjunction of painting and poetry with a puriry that is rarely
equalled in any other picture by Turner; Constable's close friend,
ArchdeaconFisher,calledit'a picture of pictures'.
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