A small panel painting showing a fleet of merchant vessels caught in a violent storm. The principal ship, in the foreground, is English and is shown pitching on a giant wave. She flies the St George flag from the mainmast whilst another flag, possibly the striped ensign of the East India Company, flies from her stern. Also on her stern is a painted or carved figure of Fortune, in the form of a naked female figure. The figure holds a billowing sail, an attribute of Fortune, demonstrating that like the wind she is unpredictable and bestows her favours at random. The allegorical figure of Fortune or ‘Fortuna’ may allude to the name of the central vessel. The vessel is pursued by a large fish or sea monster on the left. To the right a lone barrel is floating, in the trough of a wave, on the dark green water. The dangers of the passage are represented by the monster. While the propitiatory gifts or prayers offered by the devout for safety are indicated by the barrel. As such the subject matter appears to repeat the moralist belief, perpetuated in contemporary emblem literature, of the occasional necessity to sacrifice all one’s riches in order to save one’s life. The inclusion of the monster and the barrel points to the implicit allegory of the ship as a vessel bearing mankind and the human soul across the perilous seas of life. This meaning is pictorially reinforced by the allegorical figure of Fortuna on the stern. Six figures are shown on board to remind the viewer of the possible implications of the storm for humanity. The artist has shown members of the crew to indicate that they are in control and will steer the ship to safety but must exercise vigilance, care and watchfulness. There is an emphasis on human perseverance in the face of great peril. In the background three vessels, two ships in the distance on the left and one on the right, are pitching and tossing in the waves at the mercy of the elements.

It is unusual for such a contemplative and ‘Netherlandish’ subject that the main vessel flies an English flag. An explanation has to be sought in the provenance and attribution of the painting. The panel was purchased by Eric Palmer from the collection at Ham House, near Richmond. It had hung in the ‘Green Closet’ at Ham House since at least 1683. We know this because it appears, attributed to ‘Persellus’, in an ‘estimate of pictures’ from this date. Ham House was built in 1610. From 1626 it belonged to William Murray, who established the ‘Green Closet’ for his most refined, personal collections. The house and its collections were then passed on to his daughter Elisabeth in 1655. They epitomize Stuart taste, including the strong English interest in Dutch art throughout the seventeenth century. Despite his knowledge of the 1683 inventory, Palmer unconvincingly attributed this work to the marine artist Claes Wou. This attribution was presumably influenced by the stylistic differences between it and the ‘mature’ works by Porcellis (BHC0719) from his own collection. However, it seems very unlikely that the seventeenth century owners of the painting, who obviously valued it so highly, would have mistaken the artist. Furthermore, the depiction of the sea in this work, shows similar renderings of colour and stylization to two paintings in the Royal Collection at Hampton Court. Both of which are attributed to the young Porcellis. These are his 'Storm at Sea' and 'Sea Battle at Night', both painted before 1612. The feathered, expressive brushstrokes marking the waves’ crests and the overall mannerist style of the Ham House painting point towards the same hand and an equally early date. This work should, therefore, be reattributed to Porcellis and could have been painted during the artist’s residence in London in 1606. It was perhaps intended for an English patron, from whom Murray would have acquired it, to emulate royal taste – hence the St George flag.

Jan Porcellis has long enjoyed the reputation established for him by the seventeenth century artist and author Samuel van Hoogstraten, who hailed him as ‘the great Raphael of sea painting’. The son of a Flemish Protestant captain, Porcellis was probably born in the city of Ghent c.1584. Where – and with whom – he trained remains unknown. Although Houbraken asserted that he was apprenticed in Haarlem to Hendrick Cornelisz Vroom. A lack of documentary evidence surrounding Porcellis’ early work, coupled with a distinct incongruity between the works of the two artists, has made this statement difficult to substantiate. Porcellis is likely to have lived and worked in both London and Rotterdam during the early seventeenth century, before leaving to find greater professional success in Antwerp. He entered the Antwerp Guild of St Luke in 1617, before moving back to Haarlem in 1622. Porcellis became an immensely successful painter, whose wise investments included several properties in the town of Zoeterwoude. His final pictures were painted in 1631 and he died in January 1632.