The Shipwreck – Claude Joseph Vernet, 1772

This painting tells the story of a tremendously horrific event. People are painted struggling to find safety. Lightning bolts, crashing waves and a sea in the state of tumult are dramatically highlighted. The lightning creates sparks of light on the people, the waves and the rocky cliffs. The angles in the painting move your eye from the lightning bolt to the critically slanted mast, to the tree branch jutting out from the cliff, down to the crashing wave and slanted precarious shoreline.

A quote from the artist:

“The wind came out of nowhere, lifting the sea and slamming our ship into the rocky shore. A blanket of clouds quickly closed in—but for the ragged flashes of lightning, we were in the dark. With thunder blasting like cannons at close range, men leapt into the surf, towing a line and tying the ship to a rock, while I, along with my sons, slid down the rope line to safety. A drowning woman, pulled from the sea, lay half-dead on the beach as we came ashore, and another leaned into the wind, exhausted, crying out to the heavens.”