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The Tenth Plague of Egypt
J. M. W. Turner·1802
Historical Context
Turner exhibited The Tenth Plague of Egypt at the Royal Academy in 1802, an early biblical subject that demonstrates his ambition to rival the great history painters. The painting depicts the most terrible of the Egyptian plagues, the death of the firstborn, set against a landscape of monumental Egyptian architecture under a stormy sky. Turner's choice of such a dramatic subject reflected his desire to make landscape a vehicle for the highest artistic expression.
Technical Analysis
The dramatic composition uses vast, dark architectural forms and a turbulent sky to create an atmosphere of divine terror. Turner's rendering of the supernatural darkness and the architectural scale demonstrates his early mastery of the sublime in landscape painting.
Look Closer
- ◆Look at the supernatural darkness filling the upper portion of the canvas — Turner uses massive, architectural dark forms to create an atmosphere of divine terror appropriate to the tenth plague of Egypt.
- ◆Notice the dead firstborn visible in the lower portion — the plague's specific victims in their domestic settings, the personal catastrophe within the cosmic event.
- ◆Observe the strange, livid light that Turner introduces — not natural sunrise but something more ominous, a light associated with divine judgment rather than nature.
- ◆Find the Egyptian architecture dwarfing the human figures — Turner uses architectural scale to make the scene feel genuinely ancient and to contrast human vulnerability with the overwhelming divine power.
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