The Voyage of Life

Isn't life just a trip, or a voyage you could say.

Overview

Four stages of life; Childhood, Youth, Manhood and Old Age. Four paintings. Thomas Cole, an American artist, produced this series of paintings in 1840. In all four paintings, we follow a voyager on a boat travelling alongside an angel. Each painting has its own landscape setting containing unique elements that perfectly encompass its respective stage of life.

1. Childhood

Starting off with Childhood, we get the first sight of the voyager and the angel together on the boat. The cave depicting birth with the angel being the one in control of the boat given the helplessness of a child after birth. The water is still with a peaceful sunset over the horizon, all relating to the innocence of childhood.

Another cool detail is in the front of the boat. There's a little hourglass in which no sand has fallen through yet as he is still starting off his voyage. We'll observe this hourglass in the next paintings and the condition of the boat itself.

2. Youth

Now coming to Youth, we see the angel still, however, he's no longer on the boat but also not far away, maybe guiding the voyager when he needs help who is now in control of the boat, in control of where his life is headed.

Unlike Childhood, we now see the river and landscape in full view and its vastness of it all I think shows how much is ahead of the voyager, a life of endless possibilities. As well as the voyager's expression, full of ambition and enthusiasm for what's to come.

The water is still calm as he still has not experienced any responsibilities or dangers yet. The hourglass beginning to fill up as time passes however not by much as we are still in the beginning of life.

3. Manhood

Coming to my favourite one, Manhood. There is so much going on in this one. The angel is now up above in the skies, no longer nearby, just observing over the voyager. The river is full of rocks and waves crashing creating an extremely difficult pathway depicting the challenges and stresses of going through Manhood.

The voyager's expression now is not one of ambition, but of pleading. Seems he has turned to prayer, feeling helpless in front of what lies ahead as he has no other option but to go through the rough waves. However we can see there's calm water again up ahead alluding to life returning to its calm state when going out of manhood and into old age.

4. Old Age

End of the road. Calm waters, the angel goes back to the voyager's side. The voyager almost ready to be taken away now. There's not much going on in this one and its fitting. Observe the boat's condition. Completely worn out, broken down probably by the rocky terrain he went into in manhood.

Conclusion

Such a cool concept and it's one of the first painting series I've seen. The details, the colors, the story, so good. I didn't know about Thomas Cole until I stumbled upon The Voyage of Life but after checking out his work, I discovered that he's got more painting series so I'm excited to dive into them as well.

Didn't mention this but fun fact, each painting above is based on one of the four seasons. Can you guess which one's which?