#81 - Winslow Homer ~ The New Novel ~ 1877
#81 - Biographical Sketch of Winslow Homer
Winslow Homer (1836-1910) was an American landscape painter best known for his marine subjects. He is considered one of the foremost painters
in 19th century America and a preeminent figure in American art. Largely self-taught, Homer began his career working as a commercial illustrator. He
subsequently took up oil painting, and watercolors, primarily chronicling his working vacations. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, his mother was a gifted
amateur watercolorist and Homer's first teacher. She and her son had a close relationship throughout their lives. Homer took on many of her traits,
including her quiet, strong-willed, terse, sociable nature; her dry sense of humor; and her artistic talent. Homer had a happy childhood, growing up mostly
in then rural Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was an average student, but his art talent was evident in his early years. Homer's father was a volatile, restless
businessman who was always looking to "make a killing". When Homer was thirteen, his father left to seek a fortune in the California gold rush. When
that failed, Charles left his family and went to Europe to raise capital for other get-rich-quick schemes that didn't materialize.
Homer's career as an illustrator lasted nearly twenty years. He contributed illustrations of rural New England life to magazines at a time when the
market for illustrations was growing rapidly. His quick success was mostly due to this strong understanding of graphic design and also to the adaptability
of his designs to wood engraving. In only about a year of self-training, Homer was producing excellent oil work. His mother tried to raise family funds to
send him to Europe for further study but instead his work sent Homer to the front lines of the American Civil War (1861–1865), where he sketched battle
scenes and camp life, the quiet moments as well as the murderous ones. Like with his urban scenes, Homer also illustrated women during war time, and
showed the effects of the war on the home front. The war work was dangerous and exhausting. After the war, Homer turned his attention primarily to
scenes of childhood and young women, reflecting nostalgia for simpler times, both his own and the nation as a whole.
In the early 1880s, Homer came increasingly to desire solitude, and his art took on a new intensity. In 1881, he traveled to England on his second
and final trip abroad. After passing briefly through London, he settled in Cullercoats, a village near Tynemouth on the North Sea, remaining there from the
spring of 1881 to November 1882. He became sensitive to the strenuous and courageous lives of its inhabitants, particularly the women, whom he
depicted hauling and cleaning fish, mending nets, and, most poignantly, standing at the water's edge, awaiting the return of their men. When the artist
returned to New York, both he and his art were greatly changed.
Late in 1866, motivated probably by the chance to see two of his Civil War paintings at the Exposition Universelle, Homer had begun a ten-month
sojourn in Paris and the French countryside. While there is little likelihood of influence from members of the French avant-garde, Homer shared their
subject interests, their fascination with serial imagery, and their desire to incorporate into their works outdoor light, flat and simple forms (reinforced by
their appreciation of Japanese design principles), and free brushwork.
As a result of disappointments with women or from some other emotional turmoil, Homer became reclusive in the late 1870s, no longer enjoying
urban social life. For a while, he even lived in secluded Lighthouse, with the keeper's family. After 1880, he rarely featured genteel women at leisure or
well-bred, refined, and elegant women, focusing instead on working women. Unfortunately, Homer was very private about his personal life and his
methods, even denying his first biographer any personal information or commentary, but his stance was clearly one of independence of style and a
devotion to American subjects.
In the summer of 1883, Homer moved from New York to Prout's Neck, Maine, a peninsula ten miles south of Portland. Except for vacation trips to
the Adirondacks, Canada, Florida, and the Caribbean, where he produced dazzling watercolors, Homer lived at Prout's Neck until his death. He enjoyed
isolation and was inspired by privacy and silence to paint the great themes of his career: the struggle of people against the sea and the relationship of
fragile, transient human life to the timelessness of nature. By about 1890, however, Homer left narrative behind to concentrate on the beauty, force, and
drama of the sea itself. For Homer's contemporaries, these were the most extravagantly admired of all his works. They remain among his most famous
today, appreciated for their virtuoso brushwork, depth of feeling, and hints of modernist abstraction.
#81 - Additional Works by Winslow Homer
#81 - Questions about Winslow Homer
1) What is the meaning of genteel?
a) well-bred, refined, and elegant
b) greedy and selfish
c) low born and tacky
d) wild, frenetic and crazy
2) Why do you think Homer's mother was his first art teacher?
a) his father was a gifted amateur watercolorist
b) his mother was a gifted amateur sculptor
c) his mother was a gifted amateur watercolorist
d) his mother was a gifted amateur muralist
3) Which statement best describes why Homer took up oil painting, and watercolors?
a) chronicling his working vacations
b) chronicling his life's milestones
c) chronicling his families family tree
d) chronicling his wife's increasing beauty
4) Based on Homer's strong understanding of graphic design and also to the adaptability of his designs to wood engraving , which of these
conclusions is accurate?
a) Homer experienced quick success
b) Homer experienced no success during his lifetime
c) Homer experienced posthumous success
d) Homer experienced little success
5) Which of the following is a reason for Homer's father to leave for California when Homer was thirteen?
a) to seek a his own father who had abandoned him
b) to seek a fortune in the California gold rush
c) to seek a second wife
d) to seek a career in wildlife preservation