Thames Map: Works and Walks Polluted Landscapes Tate Boat

In the Days of King Fog Enlarge image Punch 1888

On the day he died, Turner was found on the floor of his bedroom, trying to get to the window to look out at the River Thames. His doctor reported that, just before 9 am, 'the sun broke through the cloudy curtain which so long had obscured its splendour, and filled the chamber of death with a glory of light'. That 'cloudy curtain' was pollution.

Fog had long been part of the history of London. Extraordinarily dense smoke-fed fogs - later christened 'smogs' - were already on the increase in the mid-eighteenth century. During Turner's lifetime London had become the largest industrial city in the world. By his death the first 'pea-soupers' had begun to appear, peaking in the 1890s when a Chelsea health official reported that over two hundred tons of fine soot were sent into the London air every day.

Our Nasal Benefactors Enlarge image Punch 1858

Fog was associated with a wide range of negative ideas. It was seen not only as causing ill health, but also providing a mask for criminals, from pick-pockets to murderers. John Ruskin thought that 'the pollution which hung over London' had produced a physical gloom which mirrored the 'moral gloom' of English society

But not everyone saw the environmental degradation which followed the Industrial Revolution in the same way. Atmospheric pollution brought with it sublime effects which excited Turner's imagination, and were sufficiently remarkable to lure Monet across the Channel. He told his dealer 'I adore London . But what I love more than anything is the fog'. Whistler described the evening mists as clothing 'the riverside with poetry', transforming factory chimneys into Italian bell-towers, warehouses into palaces, so that 'the whole city hangs in the heavens, and fairy-land is before us'.

 
 
 
Sancta Nicotina Consolatrix:
The Poor Man's Friend
Enlarge image
Punch 1869