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Shipwreck

Thomas Cole American
Not on view
This small graphite drawing is one of at least three with this title included in the same 1977 gift, all assumed to be products of a meeting of the Sketch Club, founded in 1827 by New York artists who gathered monthly to fashion individual compositions on an agreed-upon theme. In this Shipwreck, it is unsurprising that Cole, a landscapist who seldom painted marines, barely suggested the titular subject of the drawing in the vague smoke and skein of seabirds rising from the water in the distance and the possible presence of a lifeboat at right. More characteristically, he emphasized the terrestrial forms of boulder and tree in the foreground setting off the sea, which has long since swallowed the ill-fated vessel.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Shipwreck
  • Artist: Thomas Cole (American, Lancashire 1801–1848 Catskill, New York)
  • Culture: American
  • Medium: Graphite on off-white wove paper
  • Dimensions: 4 5/8 x 6 3/8 in. (11.7 x 16.2 cm)
  • Credit Line: Gift of Erving Wolf Foundation, in memory of Diane R. Wolf, 1977
  • Object Number: 1977.182.2
  • Curatorial Department: The American Wing

More Artwork

More Artwork
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Wilderness Landscape Study
Thomas Cole
ca. 1828–41
Landscape with Tower (from McGuire Scrapbook), Thomas Cole American, Graphite on off-white wove paper, American
Landscape with Tower (from McGuire Scrapbook)
Thomas Cole
The Mountain Ford, Thomas Cole American, Oil on canvas, American
The Mountain Ford
Thomas Cole
1846
Clouds, Thomas Cole American, Oil on paper laid down on canvas, American
Clouds
Thomas Cole
ca. 1838
Sketch for View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm (The Oxbow), Thomas Cole American, Oil and pencil on composition board, American
Sketch for View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm (The Oxbow)
Thomas Cole
1836

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