Art Institute of Chicago

Netting the Fish

Winslow Homer

Date

1889

Medium

Transparent watercolor, heightened with opaque white watercolor, with rewetting, blotting, and scraping, over graphite, on moderately thick, slightly textured, cream wove paper

Culture

United States

Department

Prints and Drawings

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

An avid angler and sportsman, Homer often depicted fishing and hunting scenes in his artwork. Many of his watercolors that explore these subjects were painted on frequent trips to the Adirondack Mountains. Netting the Fish is unusual in its focus on a gentleman sportsman. Young, well groomed, and neatly attired, the fisherman in this watercolor stands in contrast to the rustic guides featured in many of the artist’s other Adirondacks works. Homer’s fluid brushstrokes describe the smooth surface of the water, and his background washes evoke the wooded shoreline seen at a distance. Netting the Fish is one of Homer’s few grisaille, or monochrome, watercolors, painted as a study of values in preparation for the etching Fly Fishing, Saranac Lake .

The authoritative record is held by Art Institute of Chicago. LinkedCulture surfaces this object and its connections; it does not alter institutional metadata.