People at leisure along the shoreline is a universal subject, and Francis Silva found it to be popular in his day. These works have become fixtures in a diverse range of American art collections, featured for their sheer beauty as well as the significance of the early luminist painter. In this superior example, numerous folks in Victorian finery stroll the shore of Long Branch, New Jersey. Our lead couple walk arm-in-arm, and parasols are apparent everywhere. An American flag tops a coastal station, and distant sails spot the horizon.

Silva’s vision in the diminutive composition emphasizes the long stretch of open beach and Atlantic Ocean. The relaxing beauty makes it easy to see why America’s first film industry established in Long Branch, and seven presidents, from Ulysses S. Grant to the unfortunate James Garfield chose to vacation, or in Garfield’s case, convalesce here, inspiring the city’s famous Seven Presidents Park. Among Long Branch’s most renown citizens, Dorothy Parker and Bruce Springsteen were born and inspired by the seashore community.

The work is a harmony of color and light, with a bygone charm that today seems so simple, but in its day was the premier destination, drawing artist Winslow Homer in 1869 to paint Victorian women strolling its environs. Silva would find his place alongside him with works such as this.

Evening light with radiating orange and red tones in the sky illuminates the world and this wonderful painting by Mary Blood Mellen of Ten Pound Island and Lighthouse within Gloucester Harbor. The Massachusetts shore is in view across the waterway while a two-masted coastal yawl works what little wind there is to make her way. Two other mariners have decided to employ their oars on their small sloop.

Mellen has rightly come into her own appreciation out of the enormous artistic shadow of Fitz Henry Lane. Gloucester locations are her featured specialty, with Ten Pound Island being a favored locale, not only of hers, but of Lane’s and Winslow Homer’s. The best of these works present just what this one has in abundance, an evening sunset full of luminous glow, serene water and a slice of the constant effort of the mariners. A New England lobster trap floats in the water as well.

This specific work, although unsigned as are the majority of her paintings, is widely published as one of the most iconic representations of Mellen’s artwork, after years of its location being unknown to the public in general. She remains an influential piece of the emergence of American Luminism.

The first and premier French beach resort south of the Seine River, Trouville began as a world renown fishing village on the western coast. Resorts, mansions and a wooden boardwalk soon dominated the shoreline then and today, while our artist, Eugene Boudin, echoes the natural beauty of the region and the rugged nature of the city’s birth in this coastal scene.

A soothing work with a wide variety of color and a sunlit vast sky, the ebb and flow of the tide conveys a sense of timelessness. A slew of fishing vessels await the rising tide alongside the pier, while across two men work on a boat below the seawall as people in elegant dress with parasols stroll the seawall towards the Trouville Lighthouse on the point. Two small boats are in the channel, one showing a splash of red hull, while sailing vessels are in view on the open Atlantic Ocean.

This work from near the end of Boudin’s prolific career is special in its reflective glassy water and accents of sunlight throughout the sky, showing partially why Boudin was bestowed the title “The King of Skies” by Claude Monett. A quite pleasing coastal vignette.

A beautiful active sea holds a sailing brigantine before a blazing sunset in this work of luminosity by C.H. Gifford, dated 1898. A heavy palette and impasto texture help to present the depth the artist sought, echoing the early 1850s’ paintings of Fitz Henry Lane, for one. The low horizon is full of interesting play in color and shadow, laying what would otherwise be an overwhelming sunset.

Gifford strove to portray realistic subjects while capturing the natural light and reflective qualities on the water. He settled in New Bedford, and his Lafayette home included a studio tower that achieved 60 feet in height, so he could enjoy an unobstructed view of the harbor and local environs. His eye for subjects was influenced heavily by the works of New Bedford painters Albert Bierstadt and William Bradford, alongside of the works by Lane.

He held a certain amount of respect and admiration for the sailing fishermen of the East Coast, and often portrayed them up close and personal, battling the harsher elements, or sharing the joyous beauty of their ‘work place’ of the open ocean and coasts. Even late in the 19TH Century, with the rising industrialization and dominance of steam propulsion, Gifford held to his preference for the working boats under sail and shoreline views of the eastern seaboard. This is a fine presentation of the highest quality of his work, in oil and quite a large canvas, quite rare for his hand.

Luminous morning coloration radiates the cloud-covered skies in this fine painting by Maurice De Haas, warming the day’s beginning for numerous mariners who started with the dawn. Every manner of ship propulsion is visible, from the stalwart sidewheeler steaming through a multitude of sailing ships to the rowed craft of the fishermen in the foreground water. Viewed from an elevated shore position, the amount of nautical traffic and the direction of the rising sun suggests a south facing shore along Cape Cod, perhaps Hyannis, or the outer shores of Long Island near Southampton.

The sky glows with a range of warm oranges, pinks and yellows, with the clouds blushing from the soft morning light to their dark edges where they are thickly layered. Sky breaks show the brilliant turquoise blue of the brightening day, and the sails of large cutter and schooner glow forth in the sun’s light. In contrast, the ocean is a thick deep green, with brown depths and flashes of red next the white streaks in interesting blends.

Nice additional touches include the anchor incorporated into the artist’s signature between his name and the date, and the wonderful original American frame with its restored gilt full of floral carving and engraved motifs. This outstanding composition needs only the luminosity created by the color and light of the artist’s vision and brushes to enrich any surroundings. The ability to depict these light qualities is what De Haas is best known for.

Captured by the esteemed Edward Moran, the premier painter of idyllic scenes of activity in and around New York Harbor, a youthful pair contemplate the day, the catch and possibly their futures along a dock situated above the water. Performed in a touching manner by featuring the youngsters, the pier top holds enough detailed objects to qualify as a still life of objects by itself: a picnic basket lunch, a pail, some carved bait and the texture of the wooden structure and boat all complement the couple. The heavy atmosphere has a cooling effect on the overall emotion of the scene, as does the thoughtful looks of introspection worn by both the boy and girl. Moran allows just enough light to filter on the water to make it glisten and the subjects stand forth.

Moran spent many of his professional days along New York’s harbor, and painted scenes which go beyond the work of the period’s traditional marine artists. Even at this distance he presents an accurate depiction of the buildings across the way and a schooner at anchor. Most likely this is near the artist’s East Hampton 19th Century home. It is possible that these are two people from the large extended Moran family living there.

The moment’s quiet echoes forth from the canvas, and holds hopeful for their futures and the possibility of landing a prize fishing catch. Moran was content to immortalize them in this pleasant vignette of historic New York.

Above the edge of the city of Ramatuelle on the Saint Tropez Peninsula, a herdsman takes in the view of the Mediterranean glory beyond the city. The medieval town his today home to the luxurious beach of Pampelonne, playground of the world’s wealthiest. In Camoin’s time, it is still primarily a small town, situated near Gassin and immortal San Tropez. The homogenous architectural style of Spanish clay and red-tile roofs is in common use, in contrast to today’s elegant hotels and resorts.

Touches of earthy brown build the foreground hillside and feed the growth of the largest green tree that brackets the reaches of the painting. Interesting to note that the artist used a suggestive, skipping stroke here and for the rooftops he was more concerned with the geometric parallel lines and deep tones depressions between the tiles.

Deep lush foliage cuts the coastal hills and canyons in this view, and the idle sense is that the day is more relaxed and less frenzied than today’s pace. The ocean is a deep blue, the sky is lightened with clouds beyond the trees, and no one cares if the man is at leisure while the two blackish goats hit the canvas as shadowy spectres, oblivious to our watching presence. The artist strode this canyon, and found a pleasant escape for us all..

A slick, cool somber mood pervades the coastal anchorage of two California lumber schooners in this early 20TH Century look by William Ritschel. The evening fog, wet but forgiving, is holding the lanterns’ glow in the air and a bit of the bright bounces back off the cool ripple of the water’s surface.

The crews are not visible, yet there is a show of activity with a cabin brightly lit in the closest schooner while the sails are being slackened on the other. The blunt fore-and-aft rigged vessels could pile quite high with wood cut from the Pacific Northwest forests and ship coastwise from San Diego to Olympia. In those ports, merchant ships from the world over would procure the lumber to foster the greatest building expansion the world has ever experience in the decades of the late 19TH and early 20TH Centuries.

From the elevated perspective, it is easy to imagine Ritschel stalking the cliff sides of California and spotting the schooners in the open calm. The oil on the canvas is stroked and worked so excessively that it has the feel of mist itself, and most likely some California fog is imbued into the mix from his open air Carmel studio where he painted. The small gig boats tethered with rope make it possible for the sailors and artist to have visited each other as well.

An excellent work showing the precision frequently present in his oils, Bricher brings forth similar ships of different scale. Focusing on sailing subjects, he presents an accomplished overview of a vast distance of this Northeast Coast anchorage. An expanse of clouds fill the sky, offering light variation over the promontory headland, and his brush application suggests wood textures and deep color for the hulls, the largest resting on bottom with the tide.

The unusual presentation, for a Bricher painting, of a foreground composition with well-defined vessels enhances the work’s appeal. Note the paced variation of diminutive waves rolling shoreward across the translucent water with accents of sunlight. A lone figure stands along the smaller starboard cabin. One must wonder what’s in hand- an anchor line, a fishing pole or perhaps a drift net- at the end of the rope.

Bricher, as this canvas attests, helped define the luminous school that was fundamentally devoted to displays of light and air. He strongly influenced American marine painting and helped produce some of its finest moments. Working primarily in the Boston area and later in New York, he traveled nearly every summer up the Northeast Coast looking for the seasonal qualities of light he desired, and that his art is now much in demand for depicting.

Inspired by the success of artist contemporaries such as Francis A. Silva and Alfred T. Bricher found painting luminist scenes, Warren Sheppard sets out to capture the serene essence of a fading day within this painting of the American East Coast. He physically glistens the wet sand with soft reflective color before and after the beached hull compressed by age and the unrelenting surf. At sea a schooner catches the late wind and sets a course back to port. It is peaceful yet lonely scene, and a solid atmospheric composition that uses light and color to project its content. This is a very early work by the artist, we feel, of a favorite beach in his home state.

The subtle interplay of colors works in this instance as the deep gray-green ocean rises in a short wave break, most likely along the outer New Jersey shore. The horizon glows with a warmth of rose, and the clouds are driven from the sky. The entirety is simply worked into the composition in a very tight, natural order.

Sheppard has worked layers of elements into the picture with an interesting horizontal, left to right presentation. The horizon divides the realms and yet is countered by the dark hulk. The shore break splits the swell while its rhythm carries perfectly through the reflection cast across it. Everything reads left to right until the sky once again draws the eye back around to revisit and inspect the overall fine work. The emotional center draws not from the bones of the ship, but from the visit to the shore itself.

A very important moment of history for the United States Navy, the assembled mass of naval might is on formal review by President William Howard Taft and his Secretary of the Navy while on progress down the Hudson River into New York Harbor. The last of the Armed Cruiser Class met the first of the American Dreadnaught Battleships, U.S.S. ARKANSAS and WYOMING, on this epic occasion on October 14, 1912. More than 100 navy vessels from auxiliary ships to the largest of battleships were on display.

President Taft, a huge man prone to be somewhat reactionary in his decisions, if history in hindsight is allowed to make such judgements, was impressed with the direction of the country’s naval growth. He inherited the policies of President Theodore Roosevelt, and expanded the American presence throughout the hemisphere. In the midst of having decided not to campaign against Roosevelt and eventual winner Woodrow Wilson, President Taft chose to go aboard ARKANSAS (BB-33) and cruise to inspect the newly begun canal zone in Panama.

Showing his unique artistic style, Hayley Lever made a sensational impact in New York City starting in 1911 with his interpretive Post-Impressionism of such aggressive texture, brushwork and coloration. On hand to witness this epic moment, the New York Times wrote that the event was “the greatest assemblage of naval strength ever assembled.”

A consummate professional artist, Clark took great care to enjoy his life with his wife and son, Alson Jr. Extremely well traveled, and maintaining a residence in Paris, he settled into California to recover from an injury to his hearing in World War I. In this last quarter century he blended epic historic murals for the Los Angeles Cathay Circle Theater and the Pasadena Playhouse, with beautiful local scenes Clark discovered and caught with oil on canvas. Here he has locked in a precious view of the beach goers of Santa Monica.

The summer activity is in full swing, as far as the middle season may last nine months or more in California. The vast sea of beach umbrellas and the field of colors they cast drew Clark to linger and paint. Quite interesting choice is his semi-isolation, southside near the pier’s decaying underbelly with the tire inner-tube rental business languishing along with the rest. Bathers idly spend the day, with the Santa Monica Mountain to the north spanning from Topanga to Malibu and Point Dume in contrast to the hot clean California sand under Clark’s feet. While he painted many California scenes, they very rarely ever come out of private collections onto the art market.

Sensations of walking barefoot through cold, wet sand on a hot summer day are not to be taken for granted. After fighting in the American Civil War just years prior, Conrad Wise Chapman held this thought or a like one for many years. He celebrated his worldwide journeys with small panoramic paintings which feature people at leisure in their natural surroundings. The gray skies of the coast of France are famous over the globe, and for a handful of years after 1867, Chapman reveled in their cool presence.

The period dress of the well-to-do middle class is observed in the women sitting on wooden, four-legged chairs at the beach, watching the couple who are holding hands in the surf and the smallish manned sailing skiffs about their business. Flagged anchorage poles line the edge of the shelf, so inbound boats make find their marks. Some others frolic is the ocean as well. In the great distance, a large sailing ship and a steamer make for the headland ports across from the Normandy’s Côte Fleurie (Floral Coast). Chapman’s beach scenes of Trouville and nearby Deauville achieved his widest recognition for their fine aesthetic quality within his lifetime career. They are similar to the most important paintings of Eugene Boudin of people at the beach in this very same period.

Deep coloration presides in this painting, backlit with the luminous finale of a warm day off the New York Coast. This painting is from a view northeast of Long Island, looking southwest at the elevations of Montauk Point and Long Island Proper. De Haas, well familiar with the sailing environs of greater New York, and well beyond the waters of the sound.

The burnished sky glows with a range of warm yellows, with the cloud caps blazing strongest as the sun, well, sets. The largest ship, a steam-sail merchantman running perpendicular to the wind, cuts through the scene with several schooners sailing on the horizon for parts elsewhere. A two-masted lugger was an uncommon but not unknown of sight in New York waters, as several were used as life saving vessels as well as fishers, in part due to their very quick directional handling. Even at this distance, they are working their sailing to keep clear of the large ship.

Deep ocean currents cut through the North Atlantic, and de Haas shows he has given them notice, for his water portrays some of the chaotic action of the swells near the coastlines. In an interesting manner, he chose to impart the difficulties of vision a setting sun at sea creates, with the darkening of the lower elevations, and the brightest illumination existing on the undersides of the clouds, rising even beyond the reach of the tall ship’s masts. The last moments of precious daylight will be met with oil lamps and extended watches as the sailors head away and toward New York.

This painting is attributed to Gustave Courbet, and although listed as a collaboration in Jean Fernier’s forthcoming catalogue raissoné supplement of the artist’s work, it is our opinion that this painting is pure Courbet with possibly some assistance by Louis Augustin Augin who was, at the time it was painted, a student of Courbet in the region of Saintonge. The masterful technique used to portray the sky, sea and sand as well as the coloration in the rocks strongly suggests Courbet’s touch.

In a simple composition (also a Courbet trait) believed to be the coastline near the village of Royan, Courbet would have quite possibly been offering an example to his student and helper of how to capture the beautiful austerity of nature. Courbet’s brilliant use of thick layers of paint applied with a palette knife is another of the traits quite evident in this work.

The quality of this painting is in keeping with other examples by this important Barbizon artist. The wonderful balance of the dramatically colored sea beneath the soft clouds is bisected by the tall rocks that divide the view. It shows Courbet painting “things as they really are” the guiding principal in his work that marked his greatness.

An original and detailed narrative scene with an unusual perspective of the often depicted cliffs of normandy, the painting is a nice depiction of people at leisure. The title literally translates to “walk with the foot of a cliff in normandy”. The double entendres of walk and foot apply to both the elegant figures and the physical location’s attributes, so we’ll leave the definition to speak for itself, as the artwork does so well.

Much in keeping with his contemporary artists around the french coasts, a grey somber sky is flush with cool depth, and every beach visitor is properly, fully attired. Canes and parasols in hand, they stroll with children or their beloved pets. The foremost couple relax to watch the cutter yacht and several more sailing ships beyond the light-marked stone jetty breakwater. A lone figure prepares a bonfire stack on the beach as well.

Stevens treatment of the different textures of the beach, ocean, chalky cliffs and lush grasses is beautiful to observe in its intended full composition and interesting close-up to the surface. While it’s an impressionistic painting with loose boundaries, he gave a great deal of care to the placement of each touch of the brush. Specifically, even though there are few in the overall composition, his soft, suggestive treatment of the small wild flowers near the couple have the haphazard yet well thought out positioning true to nature. His sky has aggressive, wispy brushstrokes, and the wet sand is slick, applied in smooth layers in some spots with a stroke of a palette knife. This is a well executed painting with desirable subjects.

If a more storied port that Newport, Rhode Island exists on the American seaboard, it will have a tough time proving it. Even the vaunted ports of New York and San Francisco pale to match the activities of Newport in terms of historic longevity and sheer variety of use. History records its establishment in 1639 when Warren Coddington set out from Portsmouth to start his own settlement. Provincetown artist Reynolds Beal shows the harbor’s mature grandeur and diversity in the remarkable impressionist painting, with its view of the harbor from the Warwick Headland breakwater.

Superb with his trademark colorful vibrancy, Beal shows a turn-of-the-century square-rigged sailing ship accompanied by several sailing yachts and a schooner running upon the water. The foreground rolling waves meet the natural breakers to elevate the work. An expanse of cumulus clouds complete the imagery of this vast vista.

Landmarks confirm the location of this work combined with the unique visual geography. The dominant structure is Fort Adams, located on the Branton Cove Peninsula. The fort is one of the largest seacoast fortifications on the east coast, covering more than 23 acres. Built in the 1820s, the main battery housed the U.S. Naval Academy during the Civil War. Under its protective presence, six yacht clubs operate in the harbor, including the Newport Yacht Club, the New York Yacht Club, the U.S. Naval Yacht Club and the Ida Lewis Yacht Club, named after the harbor’s famed lifesaver of lime rock lighthouse.

A interesting homage to the issue of rank amongst the crews and officers of all vessels, a captain is carried to his ready command by one of his subordinates through the ocean surf in this coastal scene by William Edward Norton. It is along the Dutch Coast, as is recorded by the artist himself with an old label verso, extremely rare for this artist to have provided any identifying information for his painted subject.

We are told as well that it is a fishing boat, although the thick, rounded hull and dropped sideboard would have made that our first guess, as well as its Northern Europe nationality of the vessel. It was on these shores that Norton perfected his art, following in the steps of William Edward Cook, famous for such scenes through the 1850s.

A serene implication falls over the composition with Norton’s intentionally muted, soft sky tones; the atmosphere feels cool and heavy, yet the colors of the ship’s rails and hulls pop in their blue, green and red hues. The crashing white impasto of the surf gives the scene not only depth, but practically a third dimension with its thick application. The overall feeling of optimism for their success makes this a great and unusual vertical coastal scene, a perfect compliment to a traditional ship portrait.

This charming and distinguished looking couple still survive in the radiance of their youth captured for all time by the Plymouth portraitist W. Andresen. Although we know little about the artist, his skill is evident in the fine quality of these images.

Captain Evelyn R. le Marchant, commander of his Britannic majesty's battleship `Nile', posed for this portrait in Plymouth, England in January 1906. His vessel, one of the earliest battleships to operate without sails, is shown anchored in the background. The following month his lovely wife Edith posed for her portrait. These two fine images show an interesting balance with the man of the sea in his element and his shoreside wife surrounded by her garden.

Both paintings are very well done in watercolor with added body color, pencil, and charcoal. Their condition is outstanding and both are mounted in their original period frames with antique glass.

Just northwest of the famous Santa Monica Pier, a romantic rendevous of an enlisted seaman and his blonde companion is casually observed by a man that we believe to be no other than the artist David Burliuk, painted into his own work. He was renown for his top-hatted attire and shock black hair. Santa Monica and Venice beaches had become prominent destinations for the personnel of the American Armed Forces, with dance halls, amusement rides and the Big Bands in full operation in the early 1940s.

The bluff top vantage point of Palisades Park remains with its cozy fences and benches, an abrupt end to the land approaching Pacific Coast Highway today and in his painting the North Beach Resort tourist facilities are displayed in its then-fading grandeur. The pier and Venice had taken away the dominance of the 1895 structure, with was partially removed and converted later. Still, the mix of Spanish architecture and practical angled roofs and antenna with roof top patios is present.

The layered texture of the brilliant sunset and localized fauna builds the scene warmly. The shore wash hold white froth created as a true watercolorist, with the paper showing through. The reportedly dynamic Burliuk is no less so with his choice of colors with a mix of purple, red and yellow in the sky. The artistry present is charmingly simple of a small town on the verge of blooming into the megalopolis of Los Angeles.

This charming and distinguished looking couple still survive in the radiance of their youth captured for all time by the Plymouth portraitist W. Andresen. Although we know little about the artist, his skill is evident in the fine quality of these images.

Captain Evelyn R. le Marchant, commander of his Britannic majesty's battleship NILE, posed for this portrait in Plymouth, England in January 1906. His vessel, one of the earliest battleships to operate without sails, is shown anchored in the background. The following month his lovely wife Edith posed for her portrait. These two fine images show an interesting balance with the man of the sea in his element and his shoreside wife surrounded by her garden.

Both paintings are very well done in watercolor with added body color, pencil, and charcoal. Their condition is outstanding and both are mounted in their original period frames with antique glass.

Suggesting a view of the Florida Keys or possibly the Caribbean, this interesting composition by Anthony Thieme shows a local working craft, most likely a shrimper or sponge boat, wrapped in close enough to shore to be moored to a tall pine tree.

With headsails drying in the sun, the boat's crewmen busy themselves on deck at the daily tasks required to maintain a working vessel. Under the bowsprit Thieme has used soft greens to capture the translucence of shallow water on a sand bottom, gently fading as it extends to the small cay across the channel where a working schooner lies bow in to the shore.

Relatively obscure waterfront scenes from areas such as this capture and record common elements of the day to day existence of life on and around the water. Anthony Thieme enjoyed creating views of many of the unsung harbors along America's coastline, capturing their essence with his own brand of eloquence and subtle charm.

It is subjectively proven that artistic inspiration strikes individuals in varied and unique ways. In this single painting, an appreciative audience may examine how the early luminous artist brought forth a work of accomplished artistic beauty from the subject matter of the rescue of a ship which has lost most of her rig. The sense is one of relief, not disaster, and further examination illustrates just how expertly Curtis was at portraying complex emotion’s with subtle suggestive touches.

The weather holds as a fair day with an etheral fog lingering about while a coastal schooner takes passengers aboard. The danger of being stranded or even sinking has faded, and gone is the zephyr which de-masted the sailing ship. The weather has turned so fair as to make it possible for a sailing barque and sidewheel steamer to continue on to their destinations beyond the two ships, which certainly are in view to the distressed ship at distance.

Curtis is considered a rising stars of marine art; all quite unusual when it is marked that he painted more than 100 years ago. His re-emergence well established, his original takes on painting views of Boston area ships and harbors made him a local favorite then and an a nationally sought after artist today. He is one of America’s premier marine luminous artists.

The crowd is out strolling along the Long Pier of Trouville, the first and premier of the French beach resorts south of the Seine River. The age has begun to awakened beyond Quaker and Victorian sensibilities, and bathing and sea-side resorts along the Normandy coast are in full fashion. The Long Pier was built from 1885 to 1889, straight out from the center of the city. Partially on the account that it is a 5-hour train ride from Paris, the first French coastal hotels established here in the mid-19th Century to success.

A charming work with a vast depth of field for its size, the view is from standing on the pier looking back at the city. The changing tents are of a more permanent sort, an evolutionary design from the original bathing wagons used by French society which allowed the women passengers to stay sheltered right up to the water’s edge. The beach would have numerous changing tents of a temporary nature.

Narratives of people at leisure are widely enjoyed for the depictions of yesterday with the reminiscent charm each inspires. With this in mind, it is interesting to note that it was important to Loir to capture the changing face of modern France as the 20TH Century approached, and to hold artistic witness to the everyday courtesies and actions of his national citizens.

On a well traveled path, the artist set his canvas to capture a view of the Italian fishing village of Cattora, believed to be a remote portion of what is now Greater Naples and the Isola D’Ischia on the horizon beyond. Note the moorish influence to the architecture in the small village and the red terra cotta rooftops, while the virgin forest grows right to the town.

A Mediterranean lateen-rigged fishing boat, with the rust-red & light beige sails often found on craft in these waters, cuts a perpendicular line to the inlet. Small commercial fisheries still exist today along the Italian shores, keeping their markets supplied with some of the freshest seafood in Europe. The people onshore are a bit less ambitious about their quests. As a woman walks the path, another pair catch a brief rest while they talk with mule driver. All four are dressed in colorful, late 19th century peasant garb.

Dommersen’s familiarity with many European regions led him to feel right at home throughout Europe. While most of his scenes are Dutch, his Italian works share a pastoral quality of soft illumination and relaxing emotion. Almost always of the coastal waters, he expertly combines landscape and atmosphere to paint compositions which translate the entirety of an area. Cattora has since grown and evolved into a much greater metropolis, but will remain ever charming in his view.

A bright afternoon along the coast of the Netherlands sets this marine narrative by Dommersen. No less than four fishing crews have chosen to land near the Tholen Lighthouse to sell their day’s catch. The foremost crew has captured the small market of women waiting across the stream, and two masts denote the presence of others just beyond the lighthouse. The prospect of quickly selling the herring and cod in the fourth ship’s hold seems slight today.

Dommersen, a Dutch national, embraced his homeland for its vast network of inlets, channels and rivers. The Netherlands hold a great shoreline to area ratio, and the low elevation along the North Sea ensures fine tidal access to much of it. The country’s dominant economic industry has always been fishing. These crews may sail along the Ooster Schelde waterway and arrive at the town of Bergen Op Zoom, where the tall church spire rise out of the horizon five miles distant.

Using tight realism with a focus on accurate scale and exacting reflective qualities, the artist excels in presenting the local character of the land. From the uniform white cloth bonnets and colorful fabrics of the women to the deep-rouge of the sail cloth, it all accents the central feature of the stone lighthouse. Note the old fortification wall the structure is built upon, a remnant from the days when holland warred with her neighbors, usually the English. By this day, the whale-oil light atop the exterior staircase would welcome the British ships and all other visitors.

In this large and appealing seascape, Samuel Phillips Jackson has portrayed a subject close to his heart, the tranquil shoreline of west Cornwall bay. The artist spent much of his time painting in and around the coasts of Devon and Cornwall and the majority of his works feature splendid views of these pleasant regions.

Jackson has employed in this work a talent for soft coloration and muted brush technique to bring out the subtle shadings and strong textures of an ever changing shoreline. The painting shows great depth in its composition and the artist has animated the overall scene with a gentle rolling surf and the ever present seabirds.

As a painter of sea and shore, Jackson excelled amongst his peers. His paintings show a closeness to nature that he developed through endless hours spent observing the watery environment and striving to capture its elusive character. The final product of his endeavors are the paintings that survive today in some of the world's most important collections.

A crisp view of an extremely rare detailed harbor scene of the American Northeast has two dockside gentlemen enjoying a clear view from the Mattapoisett Shore, looking southwest back toward Shell Beach and Fairhaven. Historically Mattapoisett and her neighbor to the northeast, Marion, formed with the City of Rochester into the community of Old Rochester. Ned’s Point Lighthouse stands guard at the harbor entrance. A black man watches from the fourth floor of the local sailmaker’s loft.

A lithographer as well as an artist, Bonar based out of New York City in the years 1847-60, and for an amount of time after that. He had a partnership with a Mr. Cummings, who remains further unidentified. While a few lithographic works survive by Bonar, this is an extremely rare original work to come up for sale in the public market. The scene is accomplished, with accuracy points that a professional engraver would include, such as the nice proportionate scale of the ocean-going tug boat running broadside, while the sleek-lined coastal schooner departs the local wharf, with other ships at their anchorages.

The region holds its small town charm today, with summer crowds of societies elite taking residence. In the 19th century, the shipyards and lumber mills of Old Rochester supported the whaling and fishing industries of Cape Cod and Martha’s Vineyard. The primary railroad connected to Marion in 1854, so the area rebounded quickly after the Civil War and the discovery of petroleum, more than some of the neighboring towns. This American scene by the artist is an accomplish look at one of the prominent harbors of greater Buzzards Bay.

A colorful pallette combined with a feathery brush technique mark this action filled image of two grand banks schooners rounding a mark in the International Fisherman’s Races off Lunnenberg Nova Scotia. Their top hampers full and straining with the press of wind filled canvas, the American and Canadian competitors define the meaning of the schooner term “fast and able”.

The first of these popular fishing schooner races began in 1920 after a challenge was sent to Gloucester by the Halifax Herald. The Essex built Esperanto was selected to challenge the Canadian champion Delawana. With a hand picked crew, Esperanto sailed to victory and the beginning of an 18 year rivalry that produced some of the most exciting races in history.

This expressive work captures all the nostalgia of an era that glorified the American fishing schooner. Built to spend the entire fishing season at sea and then utilize their great speed to be first in with the catch, these yacht-like vessels combined beauty and a hardworking seaworthiness that marked the apex of commercial sail and a exciting chapter in yacht racing.

Period yacht racing is a rare and desirable subject for marine paintings, and a 19TH Century work from Australia of this prime subject is among the rarest finds we may offer. The artist, Charles F. Gerrard, shows up in 1882 on the Sydney professional trade list as a painter, then as a marine artist and finally as simply ‘artist’. He exhibits his first works with the Royal Art Society in Sydney in 1884, consisting of coastal scenes. He is extremely well received by his contemporaries according to newspaper reports.

The recognizable features of “The Rocks”, along the western shore of Sydney cove near the harbor bridge, stands forth as a superb background for the racing yachts. This historic location is the foundation of the British Australian empire, and today is the oldest preserved colonial district in the country, described as “Sydney’s outdoor museum”.

Fine-lined cutter yachts compete over a sailing course, with two shown in great close detail while five more hold their positions in the regatta, as the rhythmic small swells are evidence the wind favors the leaders running on close reaches with the crossing tide. The crew and yachts are very much in the British formal yachting manner, with full uniforms and the plum-bow hulls. Note that there is one crew attired in red, possibly a naval marine team, and the sail steam ship anchored in the center flies the Australian Colonial Ensign proudly.

A resplendent estate situated along what must be a north-west river in the English countryside, the home is the star subject with a complete array of British persons and vessels acting as the supporting cast. The turning-autumn colors of the foliage accentuate the alabaster manor house. Flying atop one of the seven visible chimneys in the white British Naval Ensign, signifying the naval rank of the property’s owner. The time worn paths along the river frontage are paced by two strolling couples and a woman in a full red shawl. Red is a prominent color for all the watercraft as well, in the sailors’ shirts, the competing collegiate rowing crews and the mother’s cloak of the family at leisure in the rowed boat.

The artist exhibits several fields of knowledge within the scene, and the quality of his work leaves no doubt that this is a painting by a professional artist. The neo-gothic revival shown in the flourishes of architecture are accentuated with the classic Victorian dress worn by the people in public. Then again, the simple country charm of the boy fishing, the heavily wooded groundskeeper shack and the sailors onboard the cutter speak of the artist’s knowledge of multiple professions and pursuits. This is especially apparent with the details to the racing crews, alternating the red verses blue theme to the caps, flags and bulwark rail of each oared scull, and the striped shirts of college athletes. The painting holds historic echoes of British society, sports and leisure pursuits.