| Romanticism Meets Eruptions: Volcanoes in Paintings |
| Active volcanoes are great places to visit, but the danger of a potential eruption is always | Párr. 1 |
| there. When some of them erupted with artists as viewers, it led to spectacular paintings. |
| Those demonstrations of the power of nature are important sources of inspiration for |
| Romantic artists. Romanticism emerged in the late 18th century in Europe. It rose in response |
| 5 | to the cult of reason of its time. The Lumières, Classicism and Neoclassicism imposed their |
| ideas of a world of science, geometry, and accuracy. However, Romanticism expressed itself |
| through feelings and the movements of the soul, often reflected in nature. With Romanticism, |
| artists are free from reason; they are creative geniuses whose inspiration comes from dreams, |
| nightmares, and their own consciousness. They depict fantastic characters or tormented |
| 10 | landscapes with bright colors and marked touches. |
| One of the aesthetic concepts of Romanticism is the sublime. This concept is directly | Párr. 2 |
| related to nature and the way that humans feel in it. Romantic artists painted nature through |
| what it made them feel. They didn’t paint a landscape, they painted the way they felt this |
| landscape. The vision of nature changed with Romanticism, it was no longer calm and edenic. |
| 15 | Sublime nature is wild, it dominates us, but we feel connected to it. Therefore, beauty and |
| danger can define the sublime aesthetic of nature. “The marriage of attraction and repulsion |
| we feel when we face the furies of nature” (Edmund Burke) is what artists felt when they |
| saw and painted volcanic eruptions. In paintings of eruptions, the work on the light is central. |
| It is where the sublime fully expresses itself. |
| 20 | Joseph Wright of Derby was a neoclassical artist, but there are pre-romantic | Párr. 3 |
| influences in his work. On his view of the eruption of Vesuvius, "Vesuvius from Portici" |
| (1774), the pre-romantic influence is clear in the sublime character of the painting. The |
| orange bright light that spurts from the volcano catches the eye, it’s almost dazzling. This |
| light is very powerful, it splits the thick cloud mass around the volcano and makes the |
| 25 | darkness of the night disappear. The use of chiaroscuro enhances this effect. In this light |
| stand the two aspects of the sublime: beauty and danger. The brightness of the light is |
| mesmerizing, it attracts each soul sensitive to beauty. However, this light is synonymous with |
| destruction and death. It pierces the sky and burns the earth. The smoking lava at the bottom |
| of the volcano threatens the tiny villages. |
| 30 | William Turner also stresses this feeling of danger and fear in his painting “The | Párr. 4 |
| Eruption of Vesuvius” (1817). His touch accentuates the chaos coming from the explosive |
| light. Traditionally, one opposes chaos and light, darkness and brightness, but here they |
| converge and produce an apocalyptic scene. The orange shades of the lava inflame the |
| landscape and seem to burn it. The rumbling volcano overwhelms the population. Fear makes |
| 35 | them run away but, as the light shows them this surreal scene, some of them stay still, |
| fascinated as they are in front of the wonder of nature. Sublime nature asserts its domination |
| on humanity through the light of the eruption, it is a scary but a wonderful scene. |
| Another painting that incorporates aspects of the sublime is Johan Christian Dahl’s | Párr. 5 |
| “Eruption of Vesuvius” (1826). We can divide it in two parts: the volcanic eruption and the |
| 40 | peaceful coast. It might seem strange to depict two scenes completely different in the same |
| painting. However, each one gives more power to the other. The vast smoke coming out of |
| the incandescent lava immediately attracts the viewer’s eyes, but the background of the |
| volcano intensifies the effect of destruction carried by the eruption. Dahl makes us see the |
| landscape that the volcano will destroy: The lava flows in its direction. We are therefore |
| 45 | confronted with the imminent destruction of idyllic nature. |
| On the other hand, the Italian painter Pietro Antoniani carries this aesthetic of | Párr. 6 |
| contrast in a different perspective in his painting “Eruzione del Vesuvio” (1767). The view |
| by night draws an opposition between the eruption and the presence of the Moon. These two |
| manifestations of nature are the origin of the light that illuminates the scene, but their |
| 50 | radiance is very different: They are opposed in color and effect. The flamboyant orange light |
| of the volcano is synonymous with fire and danger, it is hot and thunders. The Moon, with |
| its greyish light, inspires calm, silence, and peace. This contrast gives the eruption a more |
| powerful presence. |
| A second painting by Dahl, “Eruption of Vesuvius” (1823), brings the volcano to a | Párr. 7 |
| 55 | whole new level. In it the volcano is not one against all, it is connected with the nature around |
| it. The eruption leads to an outburst of the elements: they take back the earth. The symbiosis |
| of nature shows its power and dangerousness in a scene where no humans belong. Despite |
| their absence, the strong effects of the noises capture our senses. We can hear the rumbles of |
| the explosion and the water crashing against the rocks; we can feel the wind blowing on the |
| 60 | smoke and shaking the waves. The painting thus seems to be linked with the viewers. Pierre |
| Wat (a theoretician of Romanticism) states that nature has meaning only as a symbol of man. |
| The aim of nature and landscape painting would then be the expression of humanity. Dahl |
| doesn’t represent people in the flesh, but we can interpret his raging landscape as a symbol |
| of human torment and complexity. |
| 65 | |
| Referencia |
| Heguiaphal, Maia. (2020). “When Romanticism Meets Eruptions: Volcanoes in Paintings.” Daily Art Magazine. www.dailyartmagazine.com/volcanoes-in-paintings/. | |