An artwork on Galleree from Cleveland Museum of Art.
About the artwork
Boy with Anchor1873
Winslow Homer
In this work from a series of watercolors produced in Gloucester, MA, in the summer of 1873 Winslow Homer evokes the fraught nature of the local fishing industry by focusing not on the perilous work of adults, but rather the children they leave behind. In <em>Boy with Anchor</em>, the massive anchor pointing toward the sea foreshadows the weight of the boy’s maritime destiny. The work is an early example of Homer's talent for evoking atmospheric effects and his interest in technical variety. Presumably working outdoors, Homer layered fluent washes of blue, gray, and brown transparent watercolor over his graphite underdrawing to flesh out the beach and sky. He built up the hot, pebble-studded surface of the beach by using dense gouache to draw textural detail and created the broken cloud pattern in the sky by lightly blotting his wet blue wash. The picture’s formal tensions between warm and cool colors, outline and wash, and transparency and opacity mirror the emotional tension of the scene.
The mottled texture of the sky is an example of Homer’s blotting technique—a subtractive process in which he applied a wash of water, sprinkled some breadcrumbs, and then gently rubbed the paper with his fingers in order to absorb the extra color, leaving behind a granulated texture.
watercolor and gouache with graphite
Sheet: 19.4 x 34.9 cm (7 5/8 x 13 3/4 in.)
Norman O. Stone and Ella A. Stone Memorial Fund
In the summer of 1873, the serene coastal town of Gloucester, Massachusetts, played host to an artist whose brush danced across the canvas, whispering stories of life and emotion. Winslow Homer, renowned for his evocative watercolors, found inspiration not in the roaring waves or the fishermen battling the sea, but rather in the quiet hearts of those left behind—the children who watched and waited.
In his piece, *Boy with Anchor*, the young lad stands amidst the sandy shores, a massive anchor looming beside him—its heavy presence a silent harbinger of the maritime life that awaits him. The anchor, cold and unyielding, speaks of a world filled with both promise and peril. While the adults venture into the tumultuous embrace of the ocean, this innocent boy gazes out, eyes brimming with untold dreams and unshakeable fears.
Seen through Homer’s skillful hands, the scene bursts with emotion. With the outdoors as his studio, he wielded a palette of blues, grays, and browns that came to life in gentle, fluid washes of transparent watercolor. Each layer seemed like a breeze brushing over the sands, encompassing the beauty of the beach, the vastness of the sky. The artist built the texture beneath the boy’s feet, using dense gouache to breathe life into the pebbled surface of the shore. The clouds drift above, their shapes rendered with a light blotting technique that captures the dance of light across the heavens.
In this artwork, the balance of warm and cool tones creates a harmonious tension, mirroring the balance of hope and anxiety felt by both the child and the viewer. The contrasts of outline and wash, transparency and opacity weave together a poignant narrative that highlights not just the boy's stillness, but the emotional currents of longing and anticipation.
This piece stands as an early testament to Homer’s remarkable ability to craft atmospheric effects that transcend mere imagery, inviting us to dwell in the life and heart of Gloucester, where the whispers of the ocean meet the dreams of its children—a delicate dance of longing, love, and legacy.
About the artist
Creating transformative experiences through art “for the benefit of all the people forever.”The Cleveland Museum of Art is renowned for the quality and breadth of its collection, which includes more than 66,500 artworks and spans 6,000 years of achievement in the arts. The artworks shared on this platform are sourced from the museum's Open Access data under the CC0 license. No endorsement is implied.Address: 11150 East Boulevard, Cleveland, OH, USA 44106
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