Famous work · not an exact-location map point
Watson and the Shark
Real-world connection
No single real-world viewpoint
A studio dramatisation of a 1749 event; Copley never saw Havana harbour.
- Date
- 1778-01-01
- Real-world link
- Real-world connection
Location relations
Each kind of real-world link is kept separate — a documented viewpoint is never merged with a depicted place or a creation location.
Where the original is now
Museum of Fine Arts Boston
In the collection of Museum of Fine Arts Boston
On-view status is not live-verified — check the museum before visiting.
Sources
- Museum of Fine Arts, Boston — collection record for John Singleton Copley, ‘Watson and the Shark’, accession 89.481; 1778, oil on canvas, 183.5 × 229.6 cm; gift of Mrs. George von Lengerke Meyer. Copley’s prime version of 1778 is in the National Gallery of Art, Washington; a smaller version is in the Detroit Institute of Arts (mfa.org)
- Jules David Prown, ‘John Singleton Copley’ (Harvard University Press, for the National Gallery of Art, 1966)