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Discover Winter Wonders in this Holiday Scavenger Hunt

Cassandra Anderson

2 min read December 6, 2024

We look slightly down onto a scene showing light-skinned men, women, and children ice skating on a frozen river in this horizontal landscape painting. We get the impression of hundreds of people gathered on the ice creating a crowd that extends into the hazy distance. The couple dozen closest to us are the most defined. A few clusters of people and individuals in particular draw our attention. For example, a group of three men wearing dark cloaks and hats stand in conversation on our right. Two boys nearby hold sticks and play a game similar to hockey. A small child holds two smaller sticks, perhaps to help balance. A man in the front center wears puffy scarlet-red pants with white stockings, a red jacket, and a tall brown hat with a cloud of scarlet feathers. He stands next to a woman wearing a black hooded cloak over a black skirt and raspberry-pink bodice. She tucks her hands into a cylindrical muffler held at her waist. Another elegantly dressed man in golden yellows and black and a woman in mauve pink and butter yellow stand nearby. Some of people throughout the scene wear white frilly collars and others are more simply dressed in shades of brown, gray, and black. To our right, a faded rose-red windmill stands at the river’s edge, and to our left a large house with steeply pitched and stepped roofs is enclosed within a solid fence painted with pink diamonds against black and white. Smoke rises from one chimney, and other houses and a church line the riverbank into the distance. A wooden bridge near a grove of bare trees connects spit of land near us in the lower left corner with the village beyond. Brilliant azure-blue sky is visible through breaks in the steel-gray clouds above. — Adam van Breen, Skating on the Frozen Amstel River, 1611, oil on panel, The Lee and Juliet Folger Fund, in honor of Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr., 2010.20.1

Ready to celebrate this winter season through art? Whether you seek icy cold scenes, cozy family festivities, or moments of reflection, our scavenger hunt has something for you.

Wander the galleries with family and friends. Using the prompts below as starting points, find works that speak to you. We've included some inspiration from our works on view.

1. Find your perfect winter weather.

2. Find a scene that needs a holiday soundtrack.

3. Pick out a cool winter outfit.

Georgia O'Keeffe, A Black Bird with Snow-Covered Red Hills, 1946, oil on canvas, Anonymous Gift, 2021.58.1

We look down onto a wide, bustling, tree-lined avenue filled with buildings, people, and horse-drawn carriages in this horizontal painting. Muted, warm browns, sage green, slate blue, and brick red dominate the urban scene, which is loosely painted with short and long dotted brushstrokes so some details are difficult to make out. The street extends diagonally up from our lower left with wide gray sidewalks on either side, which are lined by slender trees sparsely dotted with brown leaves. Dozens of pedestrians meander individually, in pairs, and in small groups on the sidewalks in coats and hats. Across from us, multi-storied buildings with store fronts at street level stretch across the width of the canvas. Rows of windows line the facades. Horse-drawn carriages move in both directions on the street and two omnibuses have pulled to the curb closest to us, where passengers have lined up. Two brick-red, hexagonally shaped kiosks stand opposite each other on either side of the street about halfway along the boulevard. Sunlight filters onto the scene, creating a dappled effect in some areas, especially over to our right. The artist signed and dated the painting in dark green in the lower right corner: “C.Pissarro.97.” — Camille Pissarro, Boulevard des Italiens, Morning, Sunlight, 1897, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.198

Barkley L. Hendricks, George Jules Taylor, 1972, oil on canvas, William C. Whitney Foundation, 1973.19.2

Dozens of people stand, skate, play a game like hockey, or ride horse-drawn sleds on a frozen river that winds along a town to our left and into the distance in this nearly square landscape painting. The horizon comes about a quarter of the way up the composition, and the sky above is filled with ivory-white clouds billowing up against a pale blue sky. Some of the men wear tall hats, hip-length capes over jackets, and breeches over stockings, while others are more simply dressed with rounded hats. Several of the women wear wide, pleated, plate-like neck ruffs, fur muffs, and long dresses, while others wear aprons over peanut-brown and muted blue dresses. The scene is alive with activity, including a man looking at us as he balances rakishly on one skate near the lower right corner, and a young girl sitting in a sled and pushing herself along with sticks nearby. The trees lining the snow-covered, riverside path are bare and the village to our left is painted in tones of pale tan and white. In the distance the snowy earth blends into the soft blue sky and fluffy clouds above. The artist signed the work as if he had painted his name and the date on the face of a wooden fence in the lower left corner: “AV DN 1645.” — Aert van der Neer, Winter in Holland: Skating Scene, 1645, oil on panel, Corcoran Collection (William A. Clark Collection), 2014.136.37

4. Find a food spread you’d like on your holiday table.

5. Find something that reminds you of a special tradition.

6. Find somewhere you want to travel.

From a high vantage point, we look across a snow-covered expanse at the long side of a pale, parchment-colored building with a town beyond in this horizontal landscape view. The scene is painted loosely and mostly in tones of icy blue, cream white, golden tan, and brown. Closest to us but far below, a hedge of moss-green treetops lines the sun-drenched, ivory-white field. The field slopes up to our left and a path, between two rows of cinnamon-brown trees, leads from the bottom center of the painting to the building. Four stories of mostly rectangular windows pierce the wall of the building in front of us. Shadows on the snow-covered roof are painted with thick strokes of steel blue. On the other side of the building, a second long roofline runs parallel to the first. The short side of the building, to our right, has a tower at each corner. A fawn-brown obelisk, which is a tapering, pointed column, is topped with a cross and stands in front of the building façade. Stacked and overlapping rooflines, painted broadly in azure blue and silvery gray, fade toward the distant horizon, which comes halfway up the canvas. A blanket of white clouds with arctic-blue bottoms sweep across the sky, revealing only a few small patches of vivid blue sky beyond. — André Giroux, Santa Trinità dei Monti in the Snow, 1825/1830, oil on paper on canvas, Chester Dale Fund, 1997.65.1

We look across a shaded field of snow, through a screen of loosely spaced trees at a cobalt-blue mountain that dominates this square landscape painting. The scene is painted with visible brushstrokes throughout. The base of the mountain comes about a third of the way up the composition, and a narrow band of vibrant turquoise sky runs above it, along the top edge of the canvas. The mountain curves up to its gentle peak to our left of center and slopes down gradually to our right. Patches of white snow stand out against the deep blue mountain just above the treetops. Trees along the mountaintop create a choppy contour against the sky. The broad summit of a second mountain beyond, to our right, is lit by the sun so the face is golden tan, shaded with denim blue. The slopes are painted with thick strokes that create texture on the surface of the canvas. The snowy field close to us is painted with loose brushstrokes in arctic blue. The trees are painted with deep, olive-green foliage or needles and tall, dark, straight trunks. Patches of topaz blue and fuchsia pink appear on the ground among trees to our left. — Abbott Handerson Thayer, Mount Monadnock, probably 1911/1914, oil on canvas, Corcoran Collection (Museum Purchase, Anna E. Clark Fund), 2014.79.34

We look slightly down onto five plates, bowls, and dishes filled with oysters, raisins, prunes, figs, and sweets along with a wine glass and decanter, a stack of round, wooden boxes, and two seashells arrayed on a wooden tabletop against a dark background in this horizontal still life painting. Closest to us to our left, eleven glistening oysters on the halfshell are arranged on a round, iron-gray dish. Also close to us, to our right, a white porcelain bowl with a wide, flaring lip is painted with blue flowers, and it is piled with breads, rolls, and pastries. Two shells sit near that bowl: one shimmering, spiraling, ivory-white shell with brown marks sits to our left and an elongated, white shell with a ruffle along its length sits in the lower right corner of the panel. Between and behind these two dishes is a vessel with a pedestal foot and a wide, shallow bowl, filled with white almonds and rods that have been covered with white sugar. In the back left, a dark gray bowl holds raisins and other dried fruit along with an object that could be a slice of bread or cheese. Opposite it, a similar dish holds brown figs that more closely resemble chestnuts. To the back right, the lid of one of the three round, shallow boxes stacked along the right edge of the composition leans against the pile. The inner lid is covered with quince paste, which resembles apricot preserves. One glass goblet with a wide bowl is nearly filled with amber-colored liquid in the back left corner, beyond the dried fruit. A glass decanter, also filled with gold-colored wine, sits to our left of the pedestal-footed vessel holding the sugared sweets, at the center of the composition. The still life is brightly lit from our left. — Osias Beert the Elder, Dishes with Oysters, Fruit, and Wine, c. 1620/1624, oil on panel, Patrons' Permanent Fund, 1995.32.1

Georges de La Tour, The Repentant Magdalen, c. 1635/1640, oil on canvas, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1974.52.1

A band of gray ice spans the bottom quarter of this vertical landscape painting, where dozens of people stand, skate, ride in sledges, or cluster near a slender wooden tower, all beneath a vivid blue sky screened with towering gray clouds. We look slightly down onto the scene from a distance. The cloud bank is horizontally streaked with pale yellow light along the bottom, but swells into gray puffs that break apart in several places toward the top to reveal patches of blue sky. The people below wear heavy coats, hats, and trousers, mostly in muted slate blue, gray, and brown. Many have their backs to us. Closest to us and near the lower left corner of the painting, a rectangular wooden sledge on rail-like runners holds five or six passengers, and is pulled by a brown horse toward the center distance. Nearby, a man on his hands and knees scrambles for his fallen hat. A man holds a pole like a hockey stick behind him, looking into the distance where others stand or run with more sticks. Near the bottom center of the painting, a man pushes a sledge laden with two brown bundles. The largest group of people and children gather on and around a rickety wooden pier from which the tower rises, to our right of center. A lantern-like structure sits atop a narrow platform on a tall pole, at the top of the tower. One ladder leads up to a landing about two-thirds of the way up the pole, and another leads to the top. A house with a pitched roof and smoking chimney sits on the far side of the pier, between two bare trees with curling, twisting branches. Birds fly above the tower. The ice is dark gray closest to us, and it becomes paler as it recedes into the distance. People dot the ice singly and in small groups as far as the eye can see. Far away, the silhouettes of a church with a spire, the masts of two ships, a wide tower, and a windmill line the horizon. The artist signed the work with a monogram and a date as if painted on the boat in the lower right corner: “VG 1646.” — Jan van Goyen, Ice Scene near a Wooden Observation Tower, 1646, oil on panel, The Lee and Juliet Folger Fund, 2014.35.1

7. Find something that reminds you of an ancestor or elder.

8. Find a depiction of light that takes your breath away.

9. Find a festive winter activity.

Three tall sailing ships, each with three masts and full sails, float in calm, arctic waters, surrounded by fragments of icebergs and ice floes amid a smattering of arctic animals in this horizontal landscape painting. The horizon line comes about a quarter of the way up the composition so the sails and rigging of the ships are shown against the sky. The clouds have ivory tops and lavender-purple undersides, and they curve in a C-shaped bank to cover most of the left half of the painting and to span the horizon. The three ships closest to us are spaced evenly across the composition, with the left-most the closest, and therefore the largest. The ship to our right is set a bit farther back, and the center ship is the farthest away. A rowboat holding several men has pulled alongside the boat to our left, and more men haul massive slabs of whale blubber up the side of the ship. Others walk on an ice floe nearby. Close inspection reveals more rowboats around and beyond these ships, and several more ships fading into the hazy distance along the horizon. Jagged edged chunks of icebergs as tall as the ships float around them. Closer to us, a trio of seals sits on an ice floe near the lower center of the composition, and a polar bear stands nose to nose with a cub to our right. Two narwhal whales with long tusks break the surface of the water between us and the ships, as does a whale’s tail near the boat to our right. Two walruses with long tusks sit on a floe near the center ship. A couple dozen birds, many white with black wing tips, fly low over the surface of the water across the painting. — John Ward of Hull, The Northern Whale Fishery: The "Swan" and "Isabella", c. 1840, oil on canvas, The Lee and Juliet Folger Fund, 2007.114.1

We look slightly down onto a crush of pedestrians, horse-drawn carriages, wagons, and streetcars enclosed by a row of densely spaced buildings and skyscrapers opposite us in this horizontal painting. The street in front of us is alive with action but the overall color palette is subdued with burgundy red, grays, and black, punctuated by bright spots of harvest yellow, shamrock green, apple red, and white. Most of the people wear long dark coats and black hats but a few in particular draw the eye. For instance, in a patch of sunlight in the lower right corner, three women wearing light blue, scarlet-red, or emerald-green dresses stand out from the crowd. The sunlight also highlights a white spot on the ground, probably snow, amid the crowd to our right. Beyond the band of people in the street close to us, more people fill in the space around carriages, wagons, and trolleys, and a large horse-drawn cart piled with large yellow blocks, perhaps hay, at the center of the composition. A little in the distance to our left, a few bare trees stand around a patch of white ground. Beyond that, in the top half of the painting, city buildings are blocked in with rectangles of muted red, gray, and tan. Shorter buildings, about six to ten stories high, cluster in front of the taller buildings that reach off the top edge of the painting. The band of skyscrapers is broken only by a gray patch of sky visible in a gap between the buildings to our right of center, along the top of the canvas. White smoke rises from a few chimneys and billboards and advertisements are painted onto the fronts of some of the buildings. The paint is loosely applied, so many of the people and objects are created with only a few swipes of the brush, which makes many of the details indistinct. The artist signed the work with pine-green paint near the lower left corner: “Geo Bellows.” — George Bellows, New York, 1911, oil on canvas, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, 1986.72.1

Several pieces of fruit, a bunch of green grapes, a stem of raisins, and several types of nuts in their shells are piled on a putty-brown tabletop or ledge with rounded corners against a dark background in this horizontal still life painting. The food is brightly lit from the front, and we look slightly down onto the table. There are two round red apples and two pieces of small yellow fruit, perhaps quinces, flanking a golden yellow pear at the back center. The bunch of grapes drapes over the fruit to our right and the raisins lie between the apples. Thirteen walnuts, peanuts, almonds, hazelnuts, and perhaps a brazil nut are scattered in a loose band in front of the fruit. The surface on which the still life sits becomes swallowed in shadow behind the fruit, and blends into the dark brown background. The artist signed and dated the work in dark paint in the lower right corner, almost lost in shadow under the ledge: “R.S. Duncanson 1848.” — Robert Seldon Duncanson, Still Life with Fruit and Nuts, 1848, oil on board, Gift of Ann and Mark Kington/The Kington Foundation and the Avalon Fund, 2011.98.1

Charles Warren Eaton, Woods in Winter, 1886, oil on canvas, Stephen and Andrew Trachtenberg in loving memory of Honey Trachtenberg Weiss and Henry Weiss, 2015.162.1

10. Find an image that reminds you of something you’re grateful for this year.

We’d love to see (and share) what stands out to you. Tag us on Instagram with #myngadc. Happy holidays!

Top image: Adam van Breen, Skating on the Frozen Amstel River, 1611, oil on panel, The Lee and Juliet Folger Fund, in honor of Arthur K. Wheelock, Jr., 2010.20.1.

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