Its lead character Brook Watson was a man notable as the subject of the famous painting Watson and the Shark that he commissioned by John Singleton Copley; it portrayed the event of a shark's attacking him as a youth.
It fuses many influences: the Last Judgment of Michelangelo, the monumental approach to contemporary events by Antoine-Jean Gros, figure groupings by Henry Fuseli, and possibly the painting Watson and the Shark by John Singleton Copley.
Copley was probably also influenced by Benjamin West's The Death of General Wolfe, and the growing popularity of romantic painting.
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