Rum Cay

Artist Winslow Homer (American, 1836–1910)

Date1898–1899

Mediumwatercolor over graphite with scraping out on thick, moderately textured, off-white wove paper

Dimensionssheet: 38.2 × 54.8 cm (15 1/16 × 21 9/16 in.)

ClassificationsWatercolors

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Terms

Object number1911.17

Label TextHomer made two trips to the Bahamas: 1884-85 and 1898-99. Among the roughly 25 watercolors he made on his second trip, several illustrate human vulnerability in relation to nature. For example, Rum Cay’s image of a man chasing an immense sea turtle reveals Homer’s watercolor technique at its sparest. The scene is reduced to three horizontal washes of color representing land, sea, and sky. Spatial distance is conveyed using minimal mark-making, like the bluntly truncated leg of the man. Scholars vigorously debate interpretations of Homer’s depictions of people of color. Later 20th-century scholarship often stresses that Homer’s most significant works from the American Civil War and Reconstruction years present African Americans in a positive and empathetic light. However, more recently, historians have drawn attention to his Bahamian works, which frequently preserve colonialist stereotypes of the country’s Black residents.ProvenanceEstate of the artist; (E.L. Knoedler, New York);

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