Born in Cornwall, Luny was baptised at St Ewe near Mevagissey on 20 May 1759. By 1773 he was apprenticed to the marine painter Francis Holman from whose address, Johnson Street, St George’s, London, he first exhibited at the Society of Artists in 1777 and 1778. He first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1780. Hugely prolific, Luny settled in Teignmouth in 1808–9 where he built a home in Teign Street, later called Thomas Luny House. Many of his clients were West Country families. This nocturnal view is typical of Luny’s work. It shows a romanticised view of Teignmouth handled in the manner of the French painter Claude-Joseph Vernet (1714–1789).