Sky – Northern Cuba

Brownell descended from a wealthy Rhode Island family whose livelihood derived from sugar and coffee plantations in Cuba, where he wintered between 1853 and 1866. There, he embraced the practice of sketching outdoors, inspired by the artists Thomas Cole and Frederic Edwin Church, who also painted in the Caribbean. Brownell produced a significant body of drawings, watercolors, oil studies, and finished paintings while visiting Cuba. In this rapidly executed work, Brownell captured with a thickly loaded paintbrush the dramatic, cloud-filled blue sky of the tropical island as tall palm trees appear to sway in the wind.