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The Gulf Stream

Winslow Homer American

Not on view

In the autumn of 1899, about seven months after he returned from a second trip to the Bahamas, Homer wrote a friend: "I painted in watercolors three months last winter at Nassau . . . & have now just commenced arranging a picture from some of the studies." In this watercolor, probably created around that time, Homer brings together the essential elements that appear in the finished oil painting (on view nearby): a solitary figure stranded on the deck of a dramatically tilted, dismasted boat as a massive shark menaces. To create this work—and the final composition of The Gulf Stream—Homer also revisited sketches and watercolors from his first trip to the Bahamas, fifteen years earlier, several of which are also displayed in this gallery.

The Gulf Stream, Winslow Homer (American, Boston, Massachusetts 1836–1910 Prouts Neck, Maine), Watercolor and graphite on wove paper, American

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