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A Rocky Coast

1877
Not on view
In their effort to elevate the status of watercolor in the U.S., some members of the American Watercolor Society produced works on the scale of exhibition oil paintings, and even worked heavily in gouache or body color, to lend the medium some of the richness of effect of oil. Richards joined this trend around 1876, and embellished on it by working on a dark, heavy, fibrous paper—used to line carpets—that approximated both the textural qualities of canvas and the conventional half-tone gray or brown grounds on which painters traditionally applied their colors. Richards found that his carpet paper "drawings," as he called them, were "very popular." The great Metropolitan Museum benefactor Catharine Lorillard Wolfe purchased this one at his Newport studio in 1877.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: A Rocky Coast
  • Artist: William Trost Richards (American, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1833–1905 Newport, Rhode Island)
  • Date: 1877
  • Culture: American
  • Medium: Watercolor and gouache on fibrous brown wove paper
  • Dimensions: 28 1/8 x 36 1/4 in. (71.4 x 92.1 cm)
  • Credit Line: Catharine Lorillard Wolfe Collection, Bequest of Catharine Lorillard Wolfe, 1887
  • Object Number: 87.15.6
  • Curatorial Department: The American Wing

More Artwork

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Puget Sound (from Sketchbook X), William Trost Richards American, Graphite on off-white wove paper, American
Puget Sound (from Sketchbook X)
William Trost Richards
1885
Ship Study (from Sketchbook X), William Trost Richards American, Graphite on off-white wove paper, American
Ship Study (from Sketchbook X)
William Trost Richards
1885
Wooded Landscape (from Sketchbook VII), William Trost Richards American, Graphite on off-white wove paper, American
Wooded Landscape (from Sketchbook VII)
William Trost Richards
1886
Country Road Framed by Trees (from Sketchbook VII), William Trost Richards American, Graphite on off-white wove paper, American
Country Road Framed by Trees (from Sketchbook VII)
William Trost Richards
1886
Still Life with Head and Spear (from Sketchbook X), William Trost Richards American, Graphite on off-white wove paper, American
Still Life with Head and Spear (from Sketchbook X)
William Trost Richards
1885

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