Provenance

Robert Napier

Scottish, 1791 - 1876

Explore Selected Works

We look across choppy waves at a sailboat canting at a sharp angle, with several others floating nearby or in the distance, all beneath a sky filled with charcoal-gray clouds in this horizontal painting. In the bottom third of the canvas, the battleship-gray waves are topped with frothy white crests. The boat closest to us is slightly left of center, and its mast tips wildly to our right. Sunlight catches the straw-yellow sail as it pulls taut in the wind. At least two men crouch or bend over in the wooden vessel below, as white spray kicks up off the far side of the boat. Two white seagulls, tiny in scale, fly closer to the water’s surface to our left of that boat. The next closest vessel is to our right, and it is nearly swallowed in shadow. Two men huddle at one pointed end of the narrow boat, and a crimson-red sail flaps loosely in the wind. At least four more boats in the distance, along to the horizon, range in size from a small sailboat to a three-masted ship. The sail of the smallest boat also tips sharply to our right, but the tall masts of the ship are upright, and those sails are furled. Dark clouds billow up from the horizon, but break near the upper left corner. The sky beyond is pale apricot peach, and a few streaks of light reach the water’s surface.
Willem van de Velde the Younger, After the Storm, c. 1700, oil on canvas, Corcoran Collection (William A. Clark Collection), 2016.22.7

After the Storm

Willem van de Velde the Younger · c. 1700 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  2016.22.7

A woman holds the hands of two nude children in front of a crimson-red cloth in this vertical painting. All three have pale skin and brown hair. The woman wears a forest-green dress with voluminous sleeves and a gauzy white headdress that wraps around her hair and is fastened with a band across her forehead. She stands crouching with one foot extended slightly forward in a sandal, surrounded by broken chunks of masonry and bits of burning logs. Her body faces us but she turns her head to the right. Her mouth is wide open, and her eyes cut back to our left. The woman clutches the children’s hands in both of her own. The child to our left turns away from us and reaches one hand up to touch the back of the woman’s hand. The child on the right twists away from the woman, eyes squinted up and to the right and mouth open. Behind them, fold lines create a grid across the red cloth. Slivers of grass and blue sky line each side of the composition.
Ercole de' Roberti, The Wife of Hasdrubal and Her Children, c. 1490/1493, tempera on poplar panel, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1965.7.1

The Wife of Hasdrubal and Her Children

Ercole de' Roberti · c. 1490/1493 · tempera on poplar panel ·  Accession ID  1965.7.1