Exhibitions: The Aesthetics of Travel: the Beautiful, the Picturesque, and the Sublime

Introduction

During the Eighteenth Century, travel was largely the preserve of wealthy men. European routes were restricted due to wars, roads could be hazardous, and transport was both slow and expensive. Travel was often motivated by the desire to view and collect antiquities and works of art, and many parents hoped travel would complete their sons' educations. The age was characterised by Reason and a compulsion to explain the world through mathematical principles.

By the Nineteenth Century, travellers benefited from greater freedom and safer travel, and interest grew in rapid and world-wide exploration. Women also took advantage of the increased opportunities: Mary Shelley was just one of many nineteenth-century women who won reputations for themselves as intrepid travellers (Foster, 1990).

New approaches to experiencing landscapes and travel grew out of aesthetic theories which were popular during the late Eighteenth Century and the Romantic Period (arbitrarily 1790-1850). Domestic changes in how, where and why people travelled directed a level of public attention towards the actual processes of travel, while aesthetic theory encouraged travellers to consider human relationships with the environment. Technological advances in transport multiplied travel possibilities, and amplified speed acted upon the traveller's sight and sense of stability to suggest that the external world is in a state of perpetual flux. The materialistic view of the world which had been favoured in the Eighteenth Century was largely abandoned as new theories for appreciating Nature emphasised the emotional effects of objects upon people.

Education, commerce, art and engineering had an effect upon, and were galvanised by travel. Guide books and travel writing enjoyed immense popularity and, towards the end of the Romantic Period, the modern tourist industry was established, preparing the way for Victorian colonialism and chartered travel. As this exhibition demonstrates, the Romantic philosophies still resonate with experiences of travel, passenger vision, and ways of appreciating landscape today.