Winslow Homer

There seems to be a confusion with regard to this book listing and the reviews that accompany it. I am writing about the book with 156 pages, including Index, written solely by Cikovsky, Jr. and published by Harry N. Abrams in association with The National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.It is a fine introduction for lay readers to the work and life of Homer. Deliberately set forth as a non-academic approach, it has no scholarly impedimenta but is written in a clear, informative style, with plenty of illustrations of his works.Cikovsky is just the writer the book needed: a scholar with a light touch and heavyweight knowledge. Everything one needs to know is in it, speculation is given short shrift, save where it can rest on solid evidence and with the warning that it is a stab in the dark about a man who made a point to protect his privacy and private thoughts. What we get is a story long on facts and analysis of his works and scant about the man known mostly his work. For a good portion of his life, Homer lived alone and spoke little about what he did, thought or meant. Cikovsky is careful to warn us when he is exploring the unknown with regard to the man, his life and his pictures.Winslow Homer was a premier American artist of the last half of the 19th Century, an artist who sought to capture American experience in a manner that communicated without mystification yet penetrated to the core of what we were about. Unlike many who followed him, he sought out the mysteries of the sea and the land as men and women interacted with it, the old America which was losing its centrality as the core of the national system. It is a tradition which still is potent although not dominant. It is something we can still be impacted by.The book is a sound guide to understanding and should stimulate further study in books and collections.

I could not be happier with this book. The writing and images are top notch. I am still reading it and then will present specific sections to students. What a treasure this book is.

Large beautiful book full of illustrations. Hundreds of pages of his works. Only down side is about 1/10th of the photos are in black and white and some photos are dim. I love all the included sketches; gives a great sense of what Homer was going for in composition. Well-recommended.

This is a wonderful book dedicated to Winslow Homer. I had used it as an undergraduate and found myself drawn to the wonderful index of paintings included, as well as the academic essays that contextualize Homer's works and their significance. Probably the definitive work on this great American painter.

The Winslow Homer catalog that I purchased from the Amazon reseller arrived in pristine condition, even though it was listed as in 'very good' condition in the reseller's description. A great deal; I paid as much for the shipping and handling as I did for the catalog, which sells new for $55.

What a great American or worldly painter he is and the reproductions of paintings are excellent.A top shelf book.

Nice collection of homer's painting, oil and watercolor. Even though you can find most the paint online, it is nice to have it in print.

I bought this calendar after 2012 was over just for the reproductions of Homer's works which I love. I paint in watercolors and learn so much from his paintings.

This is one of the life-enhancing catalogues of major exhibitions of the 1990s. "Winslow Homer" was shown at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art between October 1995 and September 1996. These locations were selected because Homer, arguably America's greatest and most national painter, was born and grew up in Boston, and developed as an artist and achieved success in New York.The exhibition comprised 235 works that are reproduced in colour; in addition, the catalogue includes 252 figures, mostly black and white. Art scholars of international repute have written perceptive essays based upon the latest research, these address: `The School of War', `Modern and National', `Reconstruction', `Something More than Meets the Eye' and `Good Pictures' all by Nicolai Cikovsky Jr, `A Process of Change' and `Time and Narrative Erased' by Franklin Kelly, and `Innovation in Homer's Late Watercolours', by Judith Walsh. The illustrated Chronology and List of Exhibitions in Homer's Lifetime were developed by Charles Brock, and the book also contains a Select Bibliography and an Index of Titles.In their Introduction, Cikovsky and Kelly emphasise that they have considered the artist and his works within the broader contemporary context that includes historical, social, political, intellectual and artistic aspects, as well as disentangling the psychological and sexual natures that Homer, the most reticent of artists, kept hidden during his lifetime. They point out that they were concerned to include works from across his career, beginning with the Civil War and ending with self-imposed exile at Prout's Neck, Maine. Had space and other considerations associated with the exhibition not been a constraint, many more works might have been accommodated.Born in Boston in 1836, Homer first assisted a local lithographer before moving to New York in 1859 as a freelance newspaper reporter and illustrator. Amongst other assignments he was sent to the front lines in the Civil War ("The Sharpshooter on Picket Duty", 1863, reflecting the modernity of the telescopic sight which the artist abhorred, and "Prisoners from the Front", 1866, showing up differences between the two sides and within the Confederate army).The year the war ended he painted elegant young ladies, "Croquet Players", 1865, and declared his individuality with "Bridle Path, White Mountains", 1868. He moved on to genre works, for example, in 1872 he painted "Country School" and "Snap the Whip", using models for the latter, a rarity. "Crossing the Pasture", also from 1872, is illustrated on the front cover. In such works he addressed issues that were attractive to a people psychologically and physically drained by war. "Two Guides", 1875, and "Breezing Up (A Fair Wind)", 1876 were completed just after he decided to live by selling his paintings. Negro motifs, "The Cotton Pickers", 1876, and "The Carnival (Dressing for the Carnival)", 1877, attracted public interest and his figurative watercolours, "The New Novel (Book)" and "Blackboard", both 1877, proved attractive to collectors, as did seascapes such as "Gloucester Sunset" and "Sunset Fires", 1880.In 1881, he left America and spent 2 years at Cullercoats, in the north of England, where he painted watercolours of local people, fisherwomen, "Four Fisherwomen", 1881 and "Perils of the Sea", 1881, and genre works, "Beach Scene, Cullercoats", 1881, and "Mending the Nets", 1882. This was a turning point for the artist and, in this exhibition, is given the necessary attention.In 1884, he recorded a "The Life Line" 1884, showing a rescue from the sea, which proved a great success. This, like his finished works, was developed from a great many studies. Other works that added to his reputation were the marine scenes "Undertow", 1886, and "Eight Bells", 1886. By 1890 he had moved to Prout's neck in Maine and continued to paint seascapes, "The Signal of Distress", 1890/1892-96, "High Cliff, Coast of Maine", 1894, and "Cannon Rock", 1895. In "Gulf Stream", 1899, he returned to a sketch of a dismasted yacht from 1885. His last work, "Right and Left", 1909, again indicates his outstanding ability to develop original motifs.An ongoing theme of the artist was the landscape and seascape but, as is clearly shown, he did not see nature in terms of spirituality, as the earlier Transcendentalists had done, but as a potentially terrible force.

Le livre de l'image, n'est pas celui que j'ai reçu. J'ai reçu un ouvrage souple; la couverture represente une vague sur des rochers. Cependant, le titre et l'auteur sont identiques.

Winslow Homer's paintings are enjoyable in every way, his technique is outstanding, the subject matter is always pleasing to the eye, an artist at ease with himself. Michael Roy Ettinger.

The book by Doneslson Hoopes is essentially a commentary on the paintings by Homer in two museums (Metropolitan and Broocklyn). It is really interesting and I am pleased to have it (alongside others I have on his work) because it reads like the notes you would see alongside each picture in a museum, with useful insight. And the reproductions of his pictures are excellent.But it implies that it is comprehensive which it is not, even with respect of his watercolours. Large sections of his life and work are omitted because it is just his work in those museums (ie it probably sold well in their gift shops!)