• Title
  South Sea Whalers boiling blubber. / Boats preparing to get a Whale alongside, [ca. 1876] / by Oswald W. Brierly
• Creator
  Oswald W. B. (Oswald Walters B.) Brierly, 1817-1894
• Call number
  DG 366
  
• Level of description
  fonds
• Date
  
  [ca. 1876]
• Type of material
  Graphic Materials, Watercolours
• Reference code
  440185
• Issue Copy
  Digitised
• Physical Description
  1 watercolour - with rectangular wooden panel that acts as a backing sheet - 54.7 x 97.4 cm. (sight)
  
• Access Conditions
  
  Access via appointment
• Copying Conditions
  Out of copyright: Creator died before 1955
  Please acknowledge:: Dixson Galleries, State Library of New South Wales
• Related Material
  South Sea Whalers boiling blubber. Boats preparing to get a Whale alongside / copy photograph of watercolour by Oswald W. Brierly (909417)
• General note
  
  The reverse of the mount bears two circular shaped labels, ""366"" and ""L1518""
  An article in the Illustrated London News (Vol. 69, July 1876, pp.4-5), reproduces this watercolour and elaborates on the work's merits and content: ""This picture, by Mr O.W. Brierly, in the present exhibition of the Society of Painters in Water Colours, is noticeable not only for its excellence as a work of art, but is also of considerable interest from the novelty of the subject. It appears that the customs in South Sea whaling differ in some respects form whaling as it is carried on in the Artic regions, where the blubber is cut up and put into tanks to be brought home and boiled. In the South Sea ships, which capture both sperm and 'right' whale, the whales are brought alongside, where the blubber is first stripped off in great masses, called 'blanket pieces', which are then cut up into more manageable sizes, and finally boiled down in the try-pots - large boilers fixed into brickwork on the forepart of the ship, the fuel being supplied from the scraps from which the oil has been extracted. A whaler so employed at night, with a mass of smoke rising high above the sails, which are lighted up by a red glare as the fires are stirred up, has very much the appearance of a ship on fire, and passing vessels not unfrequently bear down to render assistance for what is taken for a burning ship. We understand that the picture is a commission from Lord Elphinstone.""
  Digital order no:a128893
• Signatures / Inscriptions
  
  Titled from paper label on reverse of mount with handwritten inscription in black ink, ""South Sea Whalers boiling blubber. / Boats preparing to get a Whale alongside / (Sir) Oswald E. Brierly / Marine Painter in Ordinary / to Her Majesty / 38 Ampthill Square / London N.W.""
  Signed at lower left of image, ""O.W. Brierly""
• Subject
  Whaling.
  
• Topic
  boats
  moonlight
  seascapes (artwork)
  ships
  whalemen
  whaling industry
  
• Exhibited in
  
  Upon a painted ocean. Sir Oswald Brierly - State Library of New South Wales (18 October, 2004 - 6 February, 2005)

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