A Bit of War History: The Veteran
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
28 1/4 x 20 1/4 in. (71.8 x 51.4 cm) (framed with 84.12a and 84.12b)
Classification
Painting
Culture
American
Department
The American Wing
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
Gift of Charles Stewart Smith, 1884
Accession Number
84.12c
Tags
Art Historical Context
**A Bit of War History The Veteran** (1866) by Thomas Waterman Wood captures human toll of the American Civil just a year after its end. in oil on canvas—a medium prized for its luminous depth and ability to render fine textures like weathered uniforms and expressive faces—this intimate portrait (28¼ × 20¼ inches) depicts a solitary soldier, embodying the era's reflections on sacrifice and survival. Wood, a prominent American genre painter, specialized in everyday scenes of 19th-century life, often highlighting ordinary heroes with realistic detail and emotional resonance. Housed in The Metro...