Sunshine and Shadow, Prout's Neck
1894
Medium
Watercolor, with rewetting and blotting, over graphite, on thick, rough-textured, ivory wove paper
Dimensions
38.5 × 54.6 cm (15 3/16 × 21 1/2 in.)
Classification
watercolor
Department
Prints and Drawings
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Accession Number
16834
Rights
Public Domain
About this artwork
As its title implies, Sunshine and Shadow, Prout’s Neck explores a specific effect of light on the sea. This watercolor places the viewer on the rocky Maine shore among the scrub and juniper bushes, the latter rendered in fluid black strokes with an elegance of gesture comparable to Japanese calligraphy. Despite Homer's stated antipathy to the straight horizon line, the artist’s 1894 group of reductive Prout's Neck watercolors focuses on the horizon as a locus of beauty. Accordingly, Homer start...
About the Artist
Winslow Homer · 1836–1910
Winslow Homer (1836-1910) was one of America's greatest painters and a preeminent figure in 19th-century American art. Largely self-taught, Homer began his career as a commercial illustrator and Civil War correspondent for Harper's Weekly before becoming renowned for his powerful marine subjects and landscape paintings. His mastery of both oil and watercolor, combined with his uncompromising reali...