Tag: Arctic

More visions of the Arctic, these from 1824 and of the native Eskimaux. William Edward Parry’s “Journal of a Second Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific; Performed in the years 1821-22-23 in His Majesty’s Ships “Fury” and “Hecla.” (Captain Parry’s journal) Published in London.

Canoe of the Savage Islands: Hudson’s Strait. Page 63 from William Edward Parry’s Journal of a Second Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific; Performed in the years 1821-22-23 in His Majesty’s Ships “Fury” and “Hecla. Drawn by Captain Lyon, Royal Navy. Edward Finden, engraver. Collections of the Smithsonian Institution. Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitalizing sponsor. In the public domain due to age. via https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/150739#page/63/mode/1up

Interior of an Eskimaux Snow-Hut: Water Island, 1822. Page 217 from William Edward Parry’s Journal of a Second Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific; Performed in the years 1821-22-23 in His Majesty’s Ships “Fury” and “Hecla. Drawn by Captain Lyon, Royal Navy. Edward Finden, engraver. Collections of the Smithsonian Institution. Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitalizing sponsor. In the public domain due to age. via https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/150739#page/217/mode/1up

Family of Eskimaux. 1822. Page 222 from William Edward Parry’s Journal of a Second Voyage for the Discovery of a North-West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific; Performed in the years 1821-22-23 in His Majesty’s Ships “Fury” and “Hecla. Drawn by Captain Lyon, Royal Navy. Edward Finden, engraver. Collections of the Smithsonian Institution. Biodiversity Heritage Library, digitalizing sponsor. In the public domain due to age. via https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/150739#page/222/mode/1up

Not sure how accurate these are but very early.

Images of the polar sea from back when the arctic was the last frontier. Taken from Edward L. Moss’s work “Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6.” Published in London in 1878.

Lunar Haloes: This is a sketch from the floes alongside the ship, of an unusually distinct Paraselena that appeared on 11th December, 1875. The haloes and cross round the moon are caused by the passage of her light through a tissue of impalpably minute needle-like crystals of ice slowly falling through the atmosphere. The snow-covered hills of Floeberg Beach are in the background, and in the foreground two officers are measuring the site with a sextant, while the long-lost Sally looks on. In summer the sun was often surrounded by a similar meteor, but intensely dazzling and tinted with colors like an outside rainbow. Plate VIII, page 84 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n84/mode/1up

Plate IX- The Dawn of 1876. H.M.S. ‘Albert” in Winter Quarters – page 49: Dawn in the latitude of Floeberg Beach is a season rather than an hour, and the growing brightness skirts round the whole horizon almost impartially. This is a sketch very early in March, looking north at midnight. At the time it was made, the spirit thermometers on the small stand, and on the tripod seen to the left of the ship, registered -70 degrees Fahrenheit. The outlines were made without much difficulty, with a pencil pushed through two pairs of worsted mitts. The colours were laide on the warmth and candlelight between decks,  and verified by repeated trips into the cold. In regions where wind could crush the ice together, or where open water existed to leeward, Arctic ships have more than once been blown to sea with the ice at their winter quarters; and, as a precautionary measure, our ship was secured to shore by chain cables, raised at intervals on casks to prevent them soaking into the sea. Page 86 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n86/mode/1up

Plate X – The ‘Albert’ in Winter Quarters, From Amongst the Barrier Bergs, March, 1876. P 50. Nowhere is it more true that ‘the low sun makes the color’ than in the Arctic regions. The ice and snow, that are wearily white in midsummer, glow with all sorts of opaline tints in the sunrise lights of March. The sketch is from amongst the floebergs to seaward of the ship. The sides of the berg in the center have been worn into columns and alcoves by the surface floods of some former summer; but it has since been forced higher on the beach, and into shallower water. Snowdrifts fill up all the gorges and ravines amongst the bergs, and are in some places so hardened by wind and infiltration of seawater, that tidal motion cracks and fissures them, especially round the grounded bergs. Page 94 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n94/mode/1up
Plate XI – WINTER QUARTERS, FROM AMONGST THE FLOEBERGS, LOOKING SOUTH. March 1876 – page 50 Quarter of a mile north of the “Alert” a field of polar floe had been pushed on shore, and split up into a number of floe bergs, with lanes and streets between them. This view of our winter quarters was obtained from the top of one of the fragments. Beyond the ship, Cape Rawson may be seen forming the western portal of Robeson Channel, while away across the strait the snowy hills of Greenland make the eastern. Page 102 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n102/mode/1up
PLATE XII – A FLOE BERG, SIMMON’S ISLAND, APRIL 1876 – page 59. The great stratified masses of salt ice that lie grounded along the shores of the Polar Sea are nothing more than fragments broken from the edges of the perennial floes. We call them floe bergs in order to distinguish them from, and yet express their kinship to, icebergs – the latter and their parent glaciers belong to more southern regions. Partly because it was a conspicuous point to push on for before halting for lunch, the floe berg on Simmon’s Island became a familiar landmark in the many trips of the supporting sledges across Black Cliff Bay; and the chill hour, while tea was preparing, was often spent in speculating on the enormous force required to push the huge square mass so high on shore. Page 106 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n106/mode/1up
PLATE XIII – ON THE NORTHERN MARCH, APRIL 8, 1876 – Page 60. On the sixth day’s march of the united northern and western parties from the ship, this sketch was outlined in pencil while the sledges passed across a floe, little if at all under one hundred and fifty feet in thickness. Like most heavy floes, its edges were piled with rubble ice, cemented and smoothed off with snow drift, showing a perpendicular wall outside, but sloping inside to the general undulating surface. The easiest road lay right across it, and with the aid of picks, a natural gap in its walls was soon converted into a practicable path. The united crews of the “Bull-dog” and “Marco Polo” are hauling the latter sledge down through the gap, while the “Challenger’s” and “Poppie’s” have just reached the spot with the first of their sledges. . Page 114 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n114/mode/1up
PLATE XV – BACK FROM THE FARTHEST NORTH – Page 65. On June 14, the northern detachment, with the relief sledges sent to its assistance, returned to the ship from its ten weeks’ march over the polar floes. The detachment had started northward seventeen strong, but only four remained able to pull in the drag belts, and of these one was the officer in command. Frost-peeled and sun-burnt, with stiffened knees, and faces and clothes stained with stearine smoke, these four led the way alongside the ship, flying the Union Jack they had carried a month’s hard march beyond every predecessor. Page 130 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n130/mode/1up
PLATE XVI – THE LAST OF THE PALEOCRYSTIC FLOE, KANE’S OPEN POLAR SEA, CAPE CONSTITUTION, FRANKLIN AND CROZIER ISLANDS IN THE DISTANCE, AUGUST 20, 1876 – Page 81. As the ships returned southward, they steamed through a large “polynia,” or water space, in Kennedy Channel. It was on a still night, late in August, and the ice-locked sea was calm enough to be the veritable “Peace Pool.” A few last fragments of polar floe lay here and there in the water, strangely reflected, and a dovekie swam beside one of them. Far away to the east, between Franklin and Crozier Islands, Cape Constitution rose above a faint line of pack.  It was Kane’s farthest point. From its base, Morton, looking on another such polynia, had naturally enough reported an open Polar Sea. The sea was open now as far southward as could be seen from the crow’s nest, and yet both ships were in difficulties before morning, and a hundred miles of Smith’s Sound pack still separated them from the North Water and home. Page 147 of Shores of the Polar Sea: A Narrative of the Arctic Expedition of 1875–6. Collections of and digitalized by the Boston Public Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/shoresofpolarsea00moss/page/n146/mode/1up

Sir Edward L. Moss was an artist and esteemed Royal Navy Surgeon, was part of the expedition and recorded this journey from his first-hand seat in the belly of HMS Alert . So a double role. All these expeditions included an artist.

Up into the Arctic and down to the Antarctic with English watercolorist Charles Hamilton Smith who was also a Lieutenant-Colonel in the Royal Artillery. Living from 1776 to 1859, he painted what he saw as he traveled around the world during his military career.

“Spitzbergen, Bearing South,” from the collection of 75 watercolors entitled “Views of Polar Regions”. 19th c. English. Watercolor and graphite. Collections of the Yale Center for British Arts, New Haven. Image © Yale Center for British Arts. Artwork itself in the public domain due to age. via https://wanderingvertexes.blogspot.com/2021/08/newtontoppen-spitzbergen-by-charles.html
“Remarkable Iceberg seen in July, 1818.” ca. 1818. English. Watercolor and graphite on moderately thick, moderately textured wove paper. Collections of the Collections of the Yale Center for British Arts, New Haven. Image © Yale Center for British Arts, Paul Mellon Collection. Artwork itself in the public domain due to age. via https://artsandculture.google.com/asset/remarkable-iceberg-charles-hamilton-smith-1776%E2%80%931859-belgian/kwFvKsdBrhN6Xw
“Victoria lands, South Polar Regions: Mont Erebus, Ross Island, Antarctica,” from the collection of 75 watercolors entitled “Views of Polar Regions”. 19th c. English. Watercolor and graphite. Collections of the Yale Center for British Arts, New Haven. Image © Yale Center for British Arts. Artwork itself in the public domain due to age. via https://wanderingvertexes.blogspot.com/2019/10/erebus-seen-by-charles-hamilton-smith.html
“Mount Sabine, Victoria Land,  Antarctica, discovered in 1841,” from the collection of 75 watercolors entitled “Views of Polar Regions”. ca. 1841. English. Watercolor. Collections of the Yale Center for British Arts, New Haven. Image © Yale Center for British Arts. Artwork itself in the public domain due to age. via https://wanderingvertexes.blogspot.com/2019/11/mount-sabine-by-charles-hamilton-smith.html
Petoowack Arctic Highlands Formation Antarctica. Undated, by 1858. British. Watercolor and graphite on cream wove paper. Charles Hamilton Smith, watercolorist (1776-1859). Collections of the Yale Center for British Art. Artwork in the public domain due to age. via Francis Rousseau @mountainpaintingsandmore on Instagram. via Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/p/CpdQ2xGM_zy/

Way up north with explorer of the Canadian Arctic Admiral Sir George Back who was also a talented watercolorist. Living from 1796 to 1878, he was also a naturalist.

“HMS Terror off a spectacular iceberg, believed to be in the Davis Strait, between Canada and Greenland.” 19th c. British. Watercolor. Signed “G Back” on the lower left. Image © Bonhams 2001-2021. Fair use license. via https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/26404/lot/165/?category=list&length=192&page=1
“First stopped by the ice.” 1826. British. Watercolor and pencil. Signed “Capt. Back” on the lower right. Dated “July 9th 1826” on the lower left and titled in the lower center. Image © Bonhams 2001-2021. Fair use license. via https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/26404/lot/166/?category=list&length=192&page=1
“Winter houses of Esquimaux.” 1826. British. Watercolor and pencil. Signed “Capt. Back” on the lower right. Dated “July 12th 1826 on the lower right. Titled on the lower center. Used as an illustration as an engraving in John Franklin’s Narrative of a second expedition to the shores of the polar sea, in the years 1825, 1826, and 1827, (London, 1828), p.121. Image © Bonhams 2001-2021. Fair use license. via https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/26404/lot/171/?category=list&length=192&page=1

Note: thinking this depicts the summer houses of the Esquimaux (Inuit) as they appear to be made of wood and the watercolor is dated July 1826, but winter is what it says.

“Boats in a Swell amongst heavy Ice.” 1826. British. Watercolor and pencil. Signed “Capt. Back on the lower right. Dated “Aug 24th 1826 on the lower left. Titled on the lower center. Used as an illustration as an engraving in John Franklin’s Narrative of a second expedition to the shores of the polar sea, in the years 1825, 1826, and 1827, (London, 1828), p.170. Image © Bonhams 2001-2021. Fair use license. via https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/26404/lot/173/?category=list&length=192&page=1

The Arctic back when it was the frontier. Plates from Sir George Back’s 1836 work “Narrative of the Arctic Land Expedition to the Mouth of the Great Fish River, and along the Shores of the Arctic Ocean,” Sir Back having been the expedition leader. He may have done the drawings these plates are based on. It doesn’t say.

“Andersons’ Fall, Haheldessa River, September 25, 1834.” Frontispiece. Page 6. E. Finden, engraver. Collections of and digitalized by the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/narrativeofarcti00back/page/n5/mode/2up
“North Shore of Great Slave Lake, August 13, 1833. Page 119, E. Finden, engraver. Collections of and digitalized by the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/narrativeofarcti00back/page/n118/mode/2up
“Beverly’s Falls, Mouth of Hoarfrost River.” Page 135. On stone by Louis Haghe, Lithographer and printer. Collections of and digitalized by the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/narrativeofarcti00back/page/n134/mode/2up
“Portage in Hoarfrost River. August 19, 1833.” Page 140. Collections of and digitalized by the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) Library. In the public domain due to age. via https://archive.org/details/narrativeofarcti00back/page/n140/mode/2up

Pictures of icebergs from back when the Arctic was the Great Frontier. Plates taken from Elisha Kent Kane’s “Arctic explorations : the second Grinnell Expedition in search of Sir John Franklin in the years 1853 to 1855, Volume II” which was published in Philadelphia in 1856.

arcticexploratiiikane_0046
“The Water.” page 30. Engraving by Van Ingen and Snyder after a drawing by the author. Contributed by the Museums Victoria. Digitalizing sponsor Atlas of Living Australia. In the public domain. via https://archive.org/details/arcticexploratiiikane/page/30/mode/2up

arcticexploratiiikane_0058
“Detached Ice-Belt.” Page 44. Engraving by Van Ingen and Snyder after a drawing by the author. Contributed by the Museums Victoria. Digitalizing sponsor Atlas of Living Australia. In the public domain. via https://archive.org/details/arcticexploratiiikane/page/44/mode/2up

arcticexploratiiikane_0081
“Ice-Raft.” Page 67. Engraving by Van Ingen and Snyder after a drawing by the author. Contributed by the Museums Victoria. Digitalizing sponsor Atlas of Living Australia. In the public domain. via https://archive.org/details/arcticexploratiiikane/page/67/mode/2up

arcticexploratiiikane_0156
“Berg-Raft.” Page 138. Engraving by Van Ingen and Snyder after a drawing by the author. Contributed by the Museums Victoria. Digitalizing sponsor Atlas of Living Australia. In the public domain. via https://archive.org/details/arcticexploratiiikane/page/138/mode/2up

Paintings of life at the top of the world just a bit back. Danish. Harald Viggo Moltke, artist. Living from 1871 to 1960 he was also an author, explorer, and served as a draftsman on four Arctic expeditions.

"Polareskimoer på vandring" (Polar Eskimoes Wandering). 1903.
“Polareskimoer på vandring” (Polar Eskimoes Wandering). 1903. Made in connection with polar explorer Knud Rasmussen’s Danish Literary Greenland Expedition in 1902 to 1904, the aim of which was to discover and collect the Inuit’s myths and their understanding of the world. Image © Nuuk Kunstmuseum, Nuuk, Greenland. Fair use license. via http://www.nuukkunstmuseum.com/en/artist-of-the-month/harald-moltke-1871-1960/

"A Study for a composition depicting participants in an expedition to Greenland."
“A Study for a composition depicting participants in an expedition to Greenland.” No date. Oil on canvas laid on panel. Image © 2019 MutualArt Services, Inc. Fair use license. via https://www.mutualart.com/Artwork/A-Study-for-a-composition-depicting-part/D7F9AEFE9C798CC7

"A Sealer's Wife carrying her child on her Back." No date.
“A Sealer’s Wife carrying her child on her Back.” No date. Oil on canvas. Image ©2019 Artnet Worldwide Corporation. Fair use license. via http://www.artnet.com/artists/harald-viggo-moltke/a-sealers-wife-carrying-her-child-on-her-back-d0VBLQHERzVcpMO83pieAQ2

"Sealers watching an Umiak in a Greenlandic Fjord." No date.
“Sealers watching an Umiak in a Greenlandic Fjord.” No date. Image © 2015 – 2019 BIDTOART. Fair use license. via https://bidtoart.com/en/fine-art/sealers-watching-an-umiak-in-a-greenlandic-fiord/3915813

Paintings of the Arctic when it was the last frontier and as glamorous to head for as outer space is now. No fur parka and mittens required.

"Fishing for walrus in the Arctic ocean." 1841.
“Fishing for walrus in the Arctic ocean.” 1841. Oil on canvas. French. Francois-August Biard, painter (1799-1882). Collection of the Chateau Musee, Dieppe, France. In the public domain in the United States because the artist has been dead over 70 years. via https://www.allposters.com/-sp/Fishing-for-Walrus-in-the-Arctic-Ocean-1841-Posters_i1737957_.htm?UPI=ONRM80&PODConfigID=8880731&sOrigID=64232

"Icebergs in the Arctic." 1882.
“Icebergs in the Arctic.” 1882. American. William Bradford, artist (1823-1892). In the public domain in the United States because the artist has been dead over 70 years. via https://paintersonpaintings.com/zaria-forman-on-william-bradford/.

"Icebergs in the Atlantic" (detail). 1870.
“Icebergs in the Atlantic” (detail). 1870. Russian. Oil on canvas. Ivan Constantinovich Aivazovsky, painter (1817-1900). Collection of the Aivazovsky National Art Gallery, Feodosia. In the public domain in the United States because the artist has been dead longer than 70 years. via https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ivan_Constantinovich_Aivazovsky_-_Icebergs_in_the_Atlantic_(detail).JPG

"Penguins in an Arctic landscape at dusk." Undated.
“Penguins in an Arctic landscape at dusk.” Undated. German/American. Oil on canvas. Hermann Herzog, painter (1832-1932). Image © paintingandframe.com. Cc License 4.0. via https://paintingvalley.com/arctic-painting#arctic-painting-18.jpg

"Icebergs." 1865.
“Icebergs.” 1865. American. Oil on board. William Bradford, artist (1832-1892). Collection of the New Bedford Whaling Museum. In the public domain in the United States because the artist has been dead over 70 years. via https://paintersonpaintings.com/zaria-forman-on-william-bradford/