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1 results

  • Chapter 1 - ‘On the Spot’

  • Eavan O'Dochartaigh, National University of Ireland, Galway
  • Book:
    Visual Culture and Arctic Voyages
    Published online:
    03 March 2022
    Print publication:
    10 March 2022, pp 20-50
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  • Summary

    Drawing, along with reading and keeping a personal diary, was one of the middle-class values central to work and pleasure that transferred to shipboard life and encouraged social cohesion on expeditions. While naval officers were expected to produce basic topographical drawings as part of their duties, individuals aboard ship, including non-officers, often created drawings for other reasons. Using original empirical research, this chapter analyses a number of sketches and watercolours by expedition members from all ranks, discusses the practicalities of sketching in the Arctic, and shows how layers of new, and often surprising, information begin to emerge when the visual material is interrogated. The contents of pictures reveal an unexpected array of responses to the Arctic environment and its people. The examination of scientific and personal documentary art from the Franklin searches points to a visual matrix of the Arctic that is far more complex than the peaked icebergs and threatened ships that dominated the public eye.