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ArtistsA floeberg, Simmon's Island, April, 1876
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| Accession no.: | Y: 49/22/12 |
| Title: | A floeberg, Simmon's Island, April, 1876 |
| Description: | Chromo-lithograph facsimile of original watercolour by Dr Edward Moss, during the British Arctic Expedition, 1875-76. |
| Medium: | Lithograph |
| Artist: | Moss, Edward Lawton |
| Note: | Published as 'Polar Sketches', a small portfolio of sixteen prints, in 1876 by Marcus Ward London. 'It is believed by both Artist and Publishers that a much fuller and more vivid idea of Arctic scenery can be produced by careful chromo-lithographic fac-similes of the original drawings made by Dr Edward L. Moss during the Expedition, than by any rendering in black and white. The sketches are not designed to illustrate the progress of the Expedition, or any stirring events in its history, so much as the appearance of the strange and desolate country by the shores of which the ships slowly steamed, the wonderful phenomena of the sky, and the effects of light and shade produced by a midnight sun, or a mid-day moon, on the ice-bound rocks which form the scenery of the region. They are here reproduced ... in order to make them more generally accessible ... It must be added that the sketches are all the work of one hand - Dr Edward L. Moss, who served on board the Alert in the Arctic Expedition which left England on the 29th of May, 1875, and entered the Arctic regions on the 4th of July in the same year. Although the Expedition failed in reaching the Pole - which was among the sailing orders on which it started - it yet achieved results of the highest scientific and geographic value. Of what kind was the life they led - what strange experiences they gained of natural phenomena, and the freaks of light on ice and rock - the accompanying drawings illustrate with a vividness and fullness never before arrived at in sketches of Arctic life'. 'The great stratified masses of salt ice that lie grounded along the shores of the Polar Sea are nothing more than fragments broken from the edges of the perennial floes. We called them floebergs in order to distinguish them from, and yet express their kinship to, icebergs - the latter and their parent glaciers belong to more southern regions. Partly because it was a conspicuous point to push on for before halting for lunch, the floeberg on Simmon's Island became a familiar landmark in the many trips of the supporting sledges across Black Cliff Bay; and the chill hour while tea was preparing was often spent in speculating on the enormous force required to push the huge square mass so high on shore' - Extract from 'Shores of the Polar Sea'. |
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