Tupa’ia, a navigator and priest from Raiatea, assisted Captain James Cook on his first voyage to the South Pacific (1769–71). The drawing shows a traditional longhouse in Tahiti situated on a beach fertile with different types of trees and plants (pandanus, breadfruit, banana, coconut and taro can all be identified).
In the foreground three canoes are being navigated by local men. The double-sailed vessel on the left is a sailing canoe and the other two boats are used for war. The bow and stern of each war canoe is decorated with a wooden ‘tiki’ sculpture (a carved image of a god or ancestor). Warriors armed with spears stand on platforms raised from the sterns of both vessels ready for battle.
Dr John McAleer explores how both British, and non-European, professional and amateur artists engaged with the British Empire via the medium of landscape art.
William Frame, the British Library’s Head of Modern Archives and Manuscripts, gives an account of Cook’s first voyage of 1768-71. Cook was instructed to observe the transit of Venus. But his expedition also had a secret aim to find lands in the south Pacific.
In the 17th century, London was at the centre of global trade, with goods and individuals arriving in the capital from all over the world. Jim Watt looks at how travel, trade and empire shaped the works of Daniel Defoe, Alexander Pope, Josiah Wedgwood, Oliver Goldsmith and Ignatius Sancho.
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