William Bradford - part 4

William Bradford, a celebrated American painter, was also a traveller and adventurer fascinated with the Arctic landscape. The Arctic Region series of works is the result of seven expeditions to the area undertaken for the purposes of art, the most ambitious of which was made in 1869. This voyage was underwritten by Boston collector and banker LeGrand Lockwood. A sealing ship called the Panther was commissioned for the trip; the vessel covered 5,000 nautical miles but was forced to turn back after being trapped for two days in pack ice. A source of great interest throughout the nineteenth century, the Arctic captured the public imagination, manifesting itself through a widespread desire for images, stories, and interpretations of this remote and desolate landscape.

For a more in-depth biography of Bradford see part 1, and for earlier work see parts 1 - 3 also. 

This is part 4 of a 4-part series on the works of William Bradford.

Continued from part 3: Photography 1869 (captions as given by Bradford) All albumen silver prints:

One of eight immense icebergs, which were discharged from the front of the glacier within 5 minutes 

Oomiak, or woman's boat 

Peter Motzfeldt and family at Kraksimiut

 Peter Motzfeldt and wife

Sandstone rock at the entrance of Karsut Fiord 

Scene from Baffin Island with icebergs in the distance

Scene on our way to Upernavik

Section of an immense berg, which was nearly half a mile in length

Section of the iceberg, which was broken off from the side, and washed in ridges

Section of the side of the glacier at Germitsialik

Side view of the front of the glacier

Side view of the glacier, where the middle is forced out more rapidly than the sides

Sophy and her sister Marea 

Steaming up the coast

Surrounded by the wildest scene possible to conceive

The "Gorilla Iceberg"

The "Panther" 

The "Panther" made fast to the floe in Melville Bay

The "Panther" moored to the heavy hummock ice

The "Panther" steaming up the Sermitalik Fiord to visit the Glacier

The Castle iceberg as seen in Melville Bay in July 

The farthest point reached 

The front of the glacier, as seen on the land, being forced over the rocks

The glacier as seen flowing or being forced down between the hills

The glacier as seen forcing itself down over land and into the waters of the fiord 

The glacier as seen when sailing up the fiord

The midnight sun in Melville Bay in August

The midnight sun in Melville Bay in August

The Panther boring through the pack and among the icebergs

The steamer among the icebergs heading to the northward

The steamer Panther forcing her way through the hummocky ice

The steamer taking soundings in front of glacier

The ugliest-looking Esquimaux woman we found

UA section of an iceberg which was nearly three quarters of a mile long and grounded in nearly 700 ft of water 

View in the fiord of what may be termed a jam of icebergs 

View looking down the fiord from the top of the glacier

View of the Sermitsialik Glacier 

View on the top of the glacier 

View showing the beautiful forms in varied shapes which the berg has assumed

Wilcox Mountain with a storm cloud

Steamer fast between floe ice and field ice, Melville Bay

1870s View in Sandwich Bay (Coast of Labrador)
oil on canvas 45.7 x 76.2 cm
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA