William Williams Hope

1802 - 1855

Explore Selected Works

A man with tanned skin is surrounded by animals as he reclines against a grassy slope in this horizontal landscape painting. The area close to us is darkened or in shadow, so some details are difficult to make out, but the land brightens under a golden sky as it recedes into the deep, hazy distance. In the lower left corner of the canvas, the man faces our right in profile, looking toward the grazing animals. He wears a wide-brimmed hat and a caramel-brown jacket over a knee-length garment. He leans back on his near arm with one leg bent and the other extended. His far hand lies across his torso and holds a short staff. A dark brown goat, tan-colored sheep, and brown and gray cows wander and nibble on muted green, scrubby growth that carpets the hilly ground, which stretches across the center and right side of the composition. Trees with laurel-green canopies grow up beyond the man, and extend off the top edge of the painting. A slender, almost leafless tree frames the scene on the right. Two men walk on a gently arched, stone bridge beyond the spindly tree. Low hills slope down to a misty blue-gray plain, where a river winds along a jagged bank dotted with trees. In the far distance, ghostly buildings stretch along a line of slate-blue mountains. A glowing sun in the upper left corner casts diffused light across the scene. The sky is scattered with wisps of thin clouds.
Anonymous Artist, The Herdsman, 17th or 18th century, oil on canvas, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1946.7.12

The Herdsman

Anonymous Artist · 17th or 18th century · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1946.7.12

Towering, pale, celery-green trees frame a view of a lush park with about a dozen elegantly dressed, light-skinned men and women in this vertical landscape painting. The color palette is dominated by moss and lemon-lime green, golden yellow, and spruce blue. The men all wear jackets with long tails over knee-breeches, and their long hair is pulled back at the napes of their necks. The women wear long dresses with full skirts and hints of lace at the sleeves and bust, and their brown or white hair is pulled up. Nine of the men and women gather to our right on a stone terrace along the bottom edge of the painting. A man in butter yellow kneels in front of a woman wearing rose pink. Around this pair, people stand, kneel, sit, or recline wearing aquamarine blue, light turquoise, or ivory white. A man and woman sit on a bench to our left, a little removed from the larger group. This woman wears ruby red and the man leaning toward her wears topaz blue. Two people in the park beyond these groups are painted with only a few strokes of pale blue and white paint, and they look over a low hedge row lining the walking path. Beds of red flowers fill the lower corners of the composition in front of a statue of a woman to our left and a person, perhaps on a fountain, to our right. The grassy walking path and trees become more blue as they fade into the hazy distance between the tall tress to either side. The sky fades from pale blue along the horizon to a silvery blue, almost white, at the top.
Jean Honoré Fragonard, A Game of Hot Cockles, c. 1775/1780, oil on canvas, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1946.7.6

A Game of Hot Cockles

Jean Honoré Fragonard · c. 1775/1780 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1946.7.6

Shown from the waist up, a man dressed in fine clothing looks out at us from against a deeply shadowed background in this vertical portrait painting. The man’s pale, peachy skin has a warm undertone that glows in a stark light source from our left. His body and face are angled to our right, and he cuts his dark eyes back to look at us under raised brows. He has a rounded, bulbous nose, and a wispy golden-brown goatee frames his closed pink lips. Shadows on his cheeks and jowls suggest soft flesh and a five o’clock shadow. Wiry brown hair curls out over his temples and down to the nape of his neck beneath a green, gold, orange, and burgundy-red skullcap. A soft brown beret rests on top of his skullcap tipped at an angle away from us. A teardrop-shaped pearl earring hangs from a gold setting in the ear we can see. He wears a cream-white tunic with gold and brown detailing along the hemlines. Over that is a dark brown, vest-like garment. The sleeves are slashed so the outer fabric is eggplant purple, and the inner slashes are golden yellow. A red cloth drapes over his left arm, farther from us, and that hand rests on a gold, spiraling shaft. A dark sash may be tied around his waist, and it seems that his other hand rests against his hip, to our left. The lower half of his chest and the background fall into deep shadow, though, so some the details there are difficult to make out. The painting is signed and dated in dark letters in a shaded area, so is nearly invisible in the lower center right; it reads, “Rembrandt f. 1650.”
Dutch 17th Century, Portrait of Rembrandt, 1650, oil on canvas, Widener Collection, 1942.9.70

Portrait of Rembrandt

Dutch 17th Century · 1650 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1942.9.70

In a lush, tree-lined park, filtered light falls across a group of about a dozen light-skinned people lounging and frolicking along the banks of a river in this vertical landscape painting. A man wearing a shell-pink jacket and pants and woman wearing a topaz-blue, full-skirted dress and rose-pink bonnet sit near each other in the lower left corner. Several younger boys pile up in a game where one person tries to ride on the back of another, to our right. They wear rolled-up pants, open-necked shirts, and some wear straw-colored hats. Tall aspens, with smooth greenish-white trunks and soft, golden leaves, are among the trees that line this placid river. A gnarled trunk twists against the cloudless blue sky above the revelers to our right. Other couples board a long, narrow boat at the riverbank in the distance.
Jean Honoré Fragonard, A Game of Horse and Rider, c. 1775/1780, oil on canvas, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1946.7.5

A Game of Horse and Rider

Jean Honoré Fragonard · c. 1775/1780 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1946.7.5

Two light-skinned men on horseback ride toward us on a rutted, country road set in a sweeping view with a watermill along a river to our left, and a screen of trees to our right in this horizontal landscape painting. The horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition, and many of the trees and the watermill are shown against the white and dove-gray clouds rolling across the pale blue sky. The riders are small in scale when compared to the landscape. The man to our left rides a chestnut-brown horse and wears a red jacket and a black, wide-brimmed hat pushed back on his head. The man to our right, on a silvery gray horse, wears a brown hat and clothing. White streaks at their necks and cuffs suggest lace or linen undershirts. Both horses walk with their bodies angled slightly to our left on the curving path. Two dogs trot ahead of the riders, toward us. A charcoal-gray, wooden bridge beyond the men to our left leads to the watermill. The squat, wide building is constructed on a stone foundation with wooden posts and beams that make a geometric pattern within the canary-yellow stucco. The gabled roof is covered with terracotta-red tiles at the peak closest to us, but the rest is thatched in gray and tawny brown. One small chimney rises from the center and the other from the end farther from us. A tall, water wheel is affixed to the shaded side of the building closest to us. A few ducks float in the grass-lined river near the lower left corner of the composition. The trees that dominate the right half of the canvas are painted with shades of moss, sage, and pine green and golden yellow. Only closer inspection reveals the tip of a church spire rising behind the treetops to our right. In the shadows beneath the trees, we also find a man wearing a tall sack on his back and holding a walking stick as he sits on a low rise near the lower right corner, and a man and child walking away from us along the path in the distance, into the trees.
Meindert Hobbema, The Travelers, 166[2?], oil on canvas, Widener Collection, 1942.9.31

The Travelers

Meindert Hobbema · 166[2?] · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1942.9.31