London Pollution

Turner, not surprisingly, painted one of the earliest pictures of London's fog in the 1835 painting, the Thames above Waterloo Bridge. Turner is a trueborn Londoner, is advertising his familiarity with London's air problem by putting smoke and atmospheric pollution at its centre. And as you can see, in here, the bridge is the central elements which are a theme that's later taken up by Monet. And it's partly obscured by the steam and smoke which rises from both sides of the river. Here, we see a shot-tower. I think you can just about to see it, which was constructed in 1826. Do you know what shot-towers are? They produce shot for guns, ammunition. And they were very smoky, one of the more smoking industries. But it's barely visible, as you can see, as are the various industries on the Lambeth side of the river. There's, on this site, there's a steamship about to dock or preparing to leave, its black smoke thrusting up to join the kind of swirling arc of smoke there. William Rodner sees this painting as a potent essay on the energy and complexity of modern polluted urbanization. Smoke, I think, here represents for a flourishing economy, which brings employment and food on tables, but also the dirt and pollution associated with the fumes. All seems to be tainted by sulfurous yellow.