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The Dead Soldier
Artwork Viewer
As a battle rages on in the distance, a fallen British
soldier is left behind, anonymous but for his red coat. Only his widow mourns
him; clutching his lifeless hand, the child at her breast cannot understand the
magnitude of this calamity. Visitors to the Royal Academy reportedly wept
before the composition upon its debut in 1789. Joseph Wright of Derby drew his
subject from a poem by John Langhorne, “The Country Justice,”
published in 1774. Both poem and picture invoke the ravages of colonial warfare
on ordinary British subjects. Neither addresses the catastrophe such wars
represented for indigenous peoples the world over.
- Artist
- Joseph Wright of Derby (1734-1797)
- Title
- The Dead Soldier
- Date
- 1789
- Object Type
- Painting
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 40 x 50 in. (101.6 x 127 cm)
- Credit Line
- Museum purchase, Roscoe and Margaret Oakes Income Fund, Estate of Don G. Speakman, Grover Magnin Endowment Fund, Bequest Funds of Henry S. Williams in memory of H. K.S. Williams, and the European Art Trust Fund
- Accession Number
- 1998.29
