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Two pale-skinned boys with their pants rolled up stand knee-deep in crystal-blue water in this horizontal watercolor on paper. Gray pebbles are scattered across a stretch of peachy-tan sand along the bottom of the sheet. Water ripples gently across a channel to a sailboat docked in front of dark gray warehouses and a brown building lining a pier. The boat is robin’s egg blue with a navy stripe across its center. In the distance to our right, two cranes for loading cargo are silhouetted against the pale blue sky that spans the top fifth of the composition. Near the beach, the two boys plant on their fists on their knees to peer down into the water. One boy stands with his back to us in the center of the composition. The other is to our left. He stoops, facing our right in profile. Both wear brimmed hats, long-sleeved shirts, and the boy on our left wears a vest in tones of peanut brown, cream and bright white, straw yellow, and nickel gray. Strokes of opaque white and sparkling blue sweep across the water so the texture of the paper shows through. The artist signed and dated the watercolor in the lower right: “W HOMER 1873.”

Winslow Homer

Boys Wading, 1873

Not on View

Medium

watercolor and gouache over graphite on wove paper

Dimensions

sheet: 24.77 × 34.93 cm (9 3/4 × 13 3/4 in.)

Credit Line

Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

Catalogue Raisonné

Goodrich/Gerdts 2005, Vol. II, no. 458

Accession Number

2014.18.15

Artists / Makers

Winslow Homer (artist) American, 1836 - 1910

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Inscription

in watercolor, lower right: W HOMER 1873

Provenance

Lawson Valentine, New York, by 1878; Lucy Houghton Valentine (Mrs. Lawson Valentine), 1891; Almira Valentine Pulsifer (Mrs. Nathan Trowbridge Pulsifer), her daughter, 1911; Harold Trowbridge Pulsifer, New York, her son, nd; Susan Nichols Pulsifer (Mrs. Harold Trowbridge Pulsifer) in trust, 1948; Alice Pulsifer Doyle (Mrs. Joseph Doyle), his niece, 1987; Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, Upperville, Virginia; bequest of Mrs. Paul Mellon to NGA, 2014.

Associated Names

Mellon, Paul

Exhibition History

1875: First Annual Exhibition of the American Society of Painters in Water Colors Held at the Galleries of the Brooklyn Art Association, 8-[20] March 1875, no. 216 (as What is It?)

1893: Seventh Annual Exhibition, American Works Not Before Exhibited, New York Athletic Club, 1 April 1893, no. 21

1911: Loan Exhibition of Paintings by Winslow Homer, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 6 Feb.-19 March 1911, no. 25

1915: Water Colors by Winslow Homer, The Museum of the Brooklyn Institute, 16 Oct.-7 Nov. 1915; The Century Association, New York, 8 Dec. 1915-c. 14 Jan. 1916, no. 15

1917: Winslow Homer & John Singer Sargent: An Exhibition of Water Colors, Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, 1-27 Nov. 1917; The Cleveland Museum of Art, 30 Nov.-31 Dec. 1917; Toledo Museum of Art, Jan. 1918; Detroit Institute of Arts, 2-28 Feb. 1918; Minneapolis Institute of Arts, March 1918; Milwaukee Art Institute, April 1918; City Art Museum of Saint Louis, 5-c. 26 May 1918; Memorial Art Gallery, Unviersity of Rochester, New York, 6 June-7 July 1918, no. 2

1936: Winslow Homer Centenary Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 15 Dec. 1936-15 Jan. 1937, no. 38

1954: The Art of Winslow Homer, Bowdoin College Museum of Fine Arts, Brunswick, Maine, and Art Department of Colby College, Waterville, Maine, 1-21 Nov., and 1-21 Dec. 1954

1963: Yankee Painter: A Retrospective Exhibition of Oils, Watercolors, and Graphics by Winslow Homer, University of Arizona Art Gallery, Tucson, 11 Oct.-1 Dec. 1963, no. 34

1970: Winslow Homer, 1836-1910: Oils, Watercolors, Drawings, Wood Engravings, William A. Farnsworth Library and Art Museum, Rockland, Maine, 10 July-7 Sept. 1970, no. 24

1983: Winslow Homer, Watercolors, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine, 7 May-19 June 1983, no. 2

1990: Winslow Homer in the 1870s: Selections from the Valentine-Pulsifer Collection, The Art Museum, Princeton (New Jersey) University, 10 Feb.-11 March 1990; Wadworth Atheneum, Hartford, Connecticut, 18 March-15 April 1990, no. 4

Bibliography

2005: Goodrich, Lloyd, and Abigail Booth Gerdts. Record of Works by Winslow Homer, vol. 2. New York: Spanierman Gallery, 2005, p. 236, no. 458.

2017: American Watercolor in the Age of Homer and Sargent. Exh. cat. Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2017: 88, no. 70.