Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema
'The Inundation of The Biesbosch in 1421"
"Lawrence Alma-Tadema painted [the top image] in the 1800s,
after a true story from 1421 when a flood carried off a cat and a cradle.
The cat jumped from side to side on the cradle to keep it upright..."
'The Inundation of The Biesbosch in 1421"
"Lawrence Alma-Tadema painted [the top image] in the 1800s,
after a true story from 1421 when a flood carried off a cat and a cradle.
The cat jumped from side to side on the cradle to keep it upright..."
John Everett Millais: 'A Flood', 1870
Images found at My Own Thoughts, via A Polar Bear's Tale [as of 2016, both sources have undergone linkrot].
A hat tip to reader Ceridwen for the name of the artist for the second image. He notes that the painting "represents an incident following the flooding of Sheffield UK after a reservoir burst in 1864."
Reposted from 2010 (wow) with a tip of the blogging cap to another (anonymous) reader who found a third painting of this subject matter:
Found on a commercial website, described as "after" the same artist (Millais) - whatever that means.
The historical event is in any case not a miracle - the cat is trying not to get wet, rather than trying to save the baby per se.
The second painting is by John Everett Millais, not Holman Hunt. It represents an incident following the flooding of Sheffield UK after a reservoir burst in 1864.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the information, Ceridwen. I've updated the text (and the title) of the post. Curious that two similar events supposedly happened four centuries apart.
DeleteCodex
DeleteNot necessarily. Probably just inspired by the original story.
Codex
DeleteThe origin of the story as you pointed out was the 1421 st Elizabeth flood in the Netherlands. Other painters combined it with biblical elements and subsequent floods.
Another one:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.mutualart.com/Artwork/The-Inundation-of-the-Biesbosch-in-1421/7C6A24EF311C657C
I wonder if their was ever a twins version that morphed into the Noah story?
ReplyDeleteCodex
ReplyDeleteDon't know who the third artist is, but after Millais probably means that many painters were inspired to paint the same subject matter. Looks a bit like romanticism. Brief search turned up many dramatic flood paintings but none with cat.
ReplyDeleteCodex
Found a fourth image by Ernest slingeneyer
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ernest_Slingeneyer_-_The_flooding.jpg
DeleteCodex
DeleteThanks. Can't find the third image's painter. Anyone?
"After" in the painting world just means a copy. The "after" gives credit to the original artist. Usually the copyist's name would be on there too though.
ReplyDeleteCat's Cradle just got a new meaning for this reader!
ReplyDelete