image and then develop them.
However, traditional artists could record images with a pencil and some paper, tools
that were far more portable for use by a
correspondent on the move from battleground to battleground.
Winslow Homer was born in 1836 in
Boston, Massachusetts. His mother was an
amateur watercolor artist, and Homer was
raised around art and artists. His mother
was his first art instructor, yet Homer was
largely self-taught. After apprenticing at a
lithographer’s shop in Boston and completing his schooling, Homer went to live
in New York to become a commercial illustrator. His employment with the popular political magazine Harper’s Weekly led
to an assignment as a war correspondent
on the battlefronts of the war that broke
out in 1861.
Homer would sketch
finely detailed images
of war: battles, training
skirmishes, the medics
at work, and men at
ease at camp.
Homer did not shy away from depicting the gritty and grisly spectacle that this
most bloody war wrought on the populace.
His attention to detail and adherence to
unvarnished realism2 earned him respect
among other war picture correspondents.
Most of Homer’s time with the army was
spent at their training camp, and he followed the troops into only a few battles.
As unafraid as Homer was to capture the
horror, and sometimes the boredom, that
was war, he never depicted a dead body in
any of his drawings.
Homer would sketch finely detailed
images of war: battles, training skirmishes, the medics at work, and men at ease at
camp. Once delivered to Harper’s Weekly,
the black and white drawings would be
converted to a wood engraving, a technique Homer had mastered. These wood
blocks would be used to print thousands
of copies of the image for print in the
magazine, and subscribers eagerly awaited each issue to read and see news of
what was happening each week on frontlines far away.
Even after the war was over, Homer
spent some time depicting war scenes in
CBS News, located here.
oil paintings. Homer felt that his time as
a war correspondent provided many opportunities to hone his craft and further
develop his observation skills. He kept a
large portfolio of sketches compiled during his three years on the frontlines and
used them for reference in paintings he
would complete many years after his stint
in the Civil War had ended.
After he left Harper’s Weekly, Homer
spent some time in Gloucester, Massachusetts, and became enamored with the fish-ermen, their families, the boats, and everything about living in a coastal community.
He was a master at capturing on canvas
the many qualities of the sea. He also ventured out to the Caribbean—quite a different kind of water from that of the gloomy
and temperamental Atlantic Ocean! The
images from these visits to tropical waters
have clarity and light that reveal Homer’s
immense skill in painting realistically.
Later on, when Homer was in his forties, he settled in Proutt’s Neck, Maine,
another coastal town, on property developed by his brother. He spent the rest of
his life there, painting in his studio and
capturing the power that was the Atlantic
Ocean. Some speculate that the easy and
comfortable nature of his later seascapes
were intentionally created in contrast to
the gritty and startling subjects of his war
paintings, which were filled with violence, injury, and loneliness.
Homer liked to use the local people of
his seaside community as his subjects.
He observed immense dignity in their
daily existence and relationship with the
sea. However, he did not limit himself to
seascapes. A fox running in a field, two
friends relaxing in a pasture, and a courting couple were also subjects faithfully
rendered by this great realist. Winslow
Homer’s painting “Snap the Whip,” a
playful depiction of a line of boys at play
on a summer field, evokes fond memories of childhood in summers gone by.
Homer is regarded as the quintessential
American artist, capturing what was the
essence of American life at the end of the
nineteenth century. For more information
about Winslow Homer, see the two video
clips provided by link in the sidebar.
Pat has been drawing and painting since
she was able to hold a crayon. Pat has a
degree in art education, a teaching credential, and has taught art in Pennsylvania
and California. In addition to being the
master artist for the See the Light ART
CLASS and ART PROJECTS DVD series,
Pat teaches art and chorus at a charter elementary school in the Los Angeles area.
Pat lives in a windy part of southern California with her husband and two almost-grown sons.