Comets and meteors in 18th and 19th century British art and science

Abstract

Comparing paintings, drawings and prints of comets and meteors in British works of art and scientific records of the 18th and 19th centuries brings us to a study of the relationship between science and art. Representations were sometimes naturalistic, sometimes symbolic and sometimes satirical. The British interest in images of comets and meteors, which were not clearly distinguished from each other during much of the period, coincided with the era that celebrated the progress in science exemplified by the discoveries of Newton (1687 for his Principia) and Halley (1705 for his comet calculations). At the end of the period in question, the invention of photography, and its subsequent improvement to the point where faint objects like comets could be recorded, altered the dynamics. The changes in both intellectual climate and technology resulted in an increasing separation between the arts and the sciences.