|
|
Conrad Martens, 1801-1878
watercolour; 53.7 x 75.7 cm
This beautiful painting of ships at anchor in the bay at Valparaiso was painted by Conrad Martens, who replaced Augustus Earle as artist aboard the Beagle when Earle's health failed. Successful scientific voyaging was one of the major achievements of the European Enlightenment, for it gave Europe mastery of the world. The culmination of more than a century of voyages of discovery, the voyage of the Beagle would provide Charles Darwin with the basis for his Origin of Species, a book which-in its concepts of evolution and the survival of the fittest-would provide the scientific rationalisation for European belief that they had reached a higher state of perfection than those peoples whom they had colonised.
< Section 2 Index | Next > < Paradise Possessed Exhibition Plan
A selection of images from the Paradise Possessed exhibition. National Library of Australia. Click here to find out more about NLA exhibitions. Copyright: ©1998, National Library of Australia
|