William Turner - Dido building Carthage Magnet

Dido building Carthage, or The Rise of the Carthaginian Empire, painted by Joseph Mallord William Turner in 1815, draws on Virgil’s Aeneid to depict Dido, Queen of Carthage, visiting the tomb being built for her dead husband Sychaeus, with the probable figure of Aeneas nearby. Turner sets the ancient city within a grand classical seaport filled with monumental architecture and radiant golden light. He deliberately drew inspiration from the seaport paintings of Claude Lorrain, combining classical grandeur with his own dramatic treatment of sunlight and atmosphere. Turner attached exceptional importance to the work and later stipulated that it should hang in the National Gallery alongside paintings by Claude.