The Lifeboat is Taken through the Dunes

Abrupt cropping, motifs reminiscent of documentaries, and snapshot-like effect – a photographic gaze – appear in many works in this room, particularly in this painting. Two intersecting diagonals lead the fishermen and the spectator through the dunes and out towards the ship in peril. The movement takes our gaze back to the starting point, the shouting fisherman. As in a photographic snapshot, he has been cropped, appealing to someone outside the image. History painting used to be a vehicle for depicting great and good deeds, presenting mythological heroes and history-makers as ideals. The common people were delegated to the parts of footsoldiers or anonymous crowds. Michael Ancher marks the culmination of an opposite endeavour: To insert common people as protagonists of a contemporary history painting.