Trains in art

A locomotive or train can play many roles in art, for example:

• As the main subject of a painting, sculpture, or photograph
• As a work of art in itself in addition to most functional considerations, especially in streamlined steam locomotives and luxury passenger accommodations of the early 20th century, known also as the Machine Age
• As a subject for a novel or film
• As a metaphor in song or poetry, particularly for physical power or directed movement (physical, romantic (phallic) or other), as in Fisherman's Blues:

::"I wish I was the brakeman

::on a hurtling, fevered train

::crashing headlong into the heartland

::like a cannon in the rain"

In 1978, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris held the exhibition "Les Temps des Gares" with the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, the National Railway Museum in York, and the Leonardo da Vinci Museum of Science and Technology in Milan.

In 2008, Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery held an exhibition entitled: "Art in the Age of Steam."

Image:Claude Monet 003.jpg, c. 1877 by Claude Monet]]

The following list is in chronological order, oldest to youngest:

• Rain, Steam and Speed – The Great Western Railway, by J. M. W. Turner, 1844
• The Berlin-Potsdam Railway, by Adolph von Menzel, 1847
• Gnome Watching Railway Train, by Carl Spitzweg, 1848
• The Lackawanna Valley, by George Inness, 1855
• The Railway Station, by William Powell Frith, 1862
• The Travelling Companions, by Augustus Egg, 1862
• Lordship Lane Station, by Camille Pissarro, c. 1870
• The Railway, by Édouard Manet, 1872
• Arrival of the Normandy Train, Gare Saint-Lazare, by Claude Monet, c. 1877
• Le Pont de l'Europe, by Gustave Caillebotte, 1880
• Mont Sainte-Victoire and the Viaduct of the Arc River Valley, by Paul Cézanne, 1882–1885
• The Lineman, by L A Ring, 1884
• States of Mind I:The Farewells, by Umberto Boccioni, 1911{{Cite web|url=https://www.moma.org/collection/works/78648|title=Umberto Boccioni. States of Mind I: The Farewells. 1911 | MoMA|website=The Museum of Modern Art|accessdate=November 10, 2022}}
• The Anxious Journey, by Giorgio de Chirico, 1913
• Railroad Sunset, by Edward Hopper, 1929
• Train in the Station, by Raoul Dufy, 1935
• Time Transfixed, by René Magritte, 1938
• Rolling Power, by Charles Sheeler, 1939{{Cite news|url=https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/04/04/modern-lifes-promise-and-perils-displayed-in-de-young-exhibit/|title=New SF exhibit captures that other era when Americans were obsessed with new technology|date=April 4, 2018|newspaper=The Mercury News|accessdate=November 10, 2022}}
• The Race, by Thomas Hart Benton, 1942[https://collection.terraamericanart.org/objects/351/the-race-also-titled-homeward-bound The Race (also titled Homeward Bound) – Works – Terra Foundation for American Art]
• Night Train (1947), Train in Evening (1957), Station in the Forest (1960) and The Sacrifice of Iphigenia (1968), by Paul Delvaux
• Horse and Train, by Alex Colville, 1954{{Cite web|url=https://www.aci-iac.ca/art-books/alex-colville/key-works/horse-and-train|title=Alex Colville, Horse and Train, 1954|website=Art Canada Institute - Institut de l’art canadien|accessdate=November 10, 2022}}
• Chair Car, by Edward Hopper, 1965
• The Sources of Country Music, by Thomas Hart Benton, 1975{{Cite web|url=https://www.heraldtimesonline.com/story/news/2004/03/28/homas-hart-benton-mural-depicts-country-music-history/118177088/|title=Thomas Hart Benton mural depicts country music history|first=J. J.|last=Perry|website=The Herald-Times|accessdate=November 10, 2022}}
• Autumn of Steam, by Terence Cuneo, 1979[https://artshortlist.com/en/journal/article/10-paintings-that-pay-homage-to-the-train 10 paintings that pay homage to the train - Art Shortlist]
• Jim Beam - J.B. Turner Train, by Jeff Koons, 1986{{Cite web|url=https://whitney.org/media/1057|title=Jeff Koons, Jim Beam—J.B. Turner Train, 1986|website=whitney.org|accessdate=November 10, 2022}}
• Brick Train, by David Mach, 1997

In the United Kingdom the Guild of Railway Artists is a group of painters of railway subjects.

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• Bridges in art
• Landscape art
• Marine art

{{reflist}}

• "Les Temps des Gares." Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou Centre de Creation Industrielle. 1978.
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20090820205601/http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/painting-trains-full-steam-ahead-818032.html Painting trains: Full steam ahead], Tom Lubbock, The Independent, 30 April 2008, pp. 12–13
• [http://tomokiakimaru.web.fc2.com/cezanne_and_the_steam_railway_1.html Tomoki Akimaru, "Cézanne and the Steam Railway (1)～(7)", 2012]

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Category:Visual arts genres

+Art

Category:19th century in the arts

Category:20th century in the arts