A Large Ship Being Caulked at Frederikshavn

On the night of 27 November 1846 the schooner Ann of Sunderland, carrying grain from Stettin to London, ran onto the reef off Skagen at the northern tip of Denmark. Local fishermen saved her crew of six and the cargo, and the wreck was sold at auction to a timber merchant who meant to rebuild her. Martinus Rørbye painted the repairs at Frederikshavn, further down the coast, in August 1847. Her name can still be read across the stern while workmen replace the planks broken in the wreck.

He painted outdoors on cardboard, and the Louvre points out grains of beach sand caught in the paint. That summer was remembered in Denmark for its heat, and the long shadows suggest late afternoon. The painter died a year later, in August 1848. The Louvre bought the picture in Copenhagen in 2023.