Boy with Anchor
In this work from a series of watercolors produced in Gloucester, MA, in the summer of 1873 Winslow Homer evokes the fraught nature of the local fishing industry by focusing not on the perilous work of adults, but rather the children they leave behind. In Boy with Anchor, the massive anchor pointing toward the sea foreshadows the weight of the boy’s maritime destiny. The work is an early example of Homer's talent for evoking atmospheric effects and his interest in technical variety. Presumably working outdoors, Homer layered fluent washes of blue, gray, and brown transparent watercolor over his graphite underdrawing to flesh out the beach and sky. He built up the hot, pebble-studded surface of the beach by using dense gouache to draw textural detail and created the broken cloud pattern in the sky by lightly blotting his wet blue wash. The picture’s formal tensions between warm and cool colors, outline and wash, and transparency and opacity mirror the emotional tension of the scene.
Colors in this work
Details
- Date
- 1873
- Dimensions
- sheet: height 0.194 m, width 0.349 m
- Origin
- America
- Department
- Drawings
- Holding institution
- Cleveland Museum of Art
- Palette
-
Select a color to find related artworks.
- Image provider
- cleveland-museum-of-art
- License
- CC0-1.0
- Credit
- Norman O. Stone and Ella A. Stone Memorial Fund
Art Genome Taxonomy
11 tags
Subject Matter
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Human Figure Both · 99%
A single male child is the central subject, identified by the museum title and description and clearly visible in the image.
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Childhood Both · 97%
The work depicts a boy, and the museum description specifically discusses Homer’s focus on children left behind by Gloucester’s fishing industry.
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Figure from the Back (Rückenfigur) Visual · 98%
The boy is shown largely from behind, facing the rocky shore and maritime equipment rather than the viewer.
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Nautical Both · 99%
A large anchor, an oar-like object, and dark netting or rope are visible on the beach; the museum places the work within a Gloucester fishing-industry series.
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Landscapes Both · 94%
The image presents a beach or shoreline, rocky terrain, sky, and distant coastal forms; the museum description identifies the setting as a Gloucester beach and discusses the rendered sky and beach.
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Implied Narrative Metadata · 90%
The museum description interprets the massive anchor pointing toward the sea as foreshadowing the weight of the boy’s maritime destiny.
Visual Qualities
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Highly Detailed Visual · 93%
The foreground contains numerous small marks and individually articulated stones, with dense textural passages across the beach.
Medium and Techniques
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Stains/Washes Both · 98%
Broad translucent passages are visible in the sky and distant shore, and the museum describes fluent transparent watercolor washes layered over graphite.
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Watercolor Metadata · 99%
The Cleveland Museum of Art records the medium as watercolor and gouache with graphite.
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Drawing Metadata · 99%
The museum classifies the object as a drawing and records it in the Drawings department.
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Work on Paper Metadata · 98%
The catalog records a sheet measuring 0.194 by 0.349 meters, supporting its classification as a work on paper.
Source & rights
Winslow Homer (American, 1836–1910). Boy with Anchor. Cleveland Museum of Art.
High-resolution sources
- Original TIFF ↗ 13,051 × 7,414 · Cleveland Museum Of Art · Available