Trains in art

A locomotive or train can play many roles in art, for example:

  • As the main subject of a painting, sculpture, or photograph
  • As a work of art in itself in addition to most functional considerations, especially in streamlined steam locomotives and luxury passenger accommodations of the early 20th century, known also as the Machine Age
  • As a subject for a novel or film
  • As a metaphor in song or poetry, particularly for physical power or directed movement (physical, romantic or other), as in Fisherman's Blues:
"I wish I was the brakeman
on a hurtling, fevered train
crashing headlong into the heartland
like a cannon in the rain"
Vor der Vollendung (Before the Completion), 1873-1876, by Paul Friedrich Meyerheim

In 1978, the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris held the exhibition "Les Temps des Gares" with the Palais des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, the National Railway Museum in York, and the Leonardo da Vinci Museum of Science and Technology in Milan.

In 2008, Liverpool's Walker Art Gallery held an exhibition entitled: "Art in the Age of Steam."

Trains in specific artworks
Arrival of the Normandy Train, Gare Saint-Lazare, c. 1877 by Claude Monet

The following list is in chronological order, oldest to youngest:

Artists specialising in trains

In the United Kingdom the Guild of Railway Artists is a group of painters of railway subjects.

See also

References

Media related to Trains in art at Wikimedia Commons

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