Summer 2017

2017 Antiques & Fine Art 119 This dynamic image, which may have been Homer’s last watercolor, was painted as the artist neared the age of seventy. After thirty years of exhibition work in the medium, he was by this time a consummate master. His memory of a recent voyage along the coast of North Carolina depicts a crew frantically shortening sail in the face of a squall, with a distant view of the lightship anchored off Cape Hatteras to warn ships away from the shoals. As if suspended in the waves as the schooner surges toward us, Homer imagines a thrilling viewpoint that captures the desperate activity, the mixed light before the storm, and the weight and translucency of the sea. Winslow Homer (1836–1910), Diamond Shoal, 1905. Watercolor and graphite on paper, 3⅞ x 21¾ inches. Private collection. “You will see, in the future I will live by my watercolors.” —Winslow Homer Y