Viewing the Ships

Maurice Prendergast's early watercolor Viewing the Ships shows a couple seated on a grassy shore overlooking a bay. The heads of the man and woman rise just above the gently curving line of the bank, uniting the foreground with the distant expanse of water and sky separated by the narrow line of the far shore, dark on the high horizon. The figures wear fashionable warm-weather attire—the woman in a voluminous light-green dress and a white hat trimmed with yellow and the man's dark suit set off by his straw boater—and are casually seated on the ground among spiky grasses and wildflowers sporting bright blue blossoms.

Along with monotype printmaking, watercolor was Prendergast's primary medium before around 1909, and it was the technique in which he worked on his earliest sketching expeditions, undertaken in the late 1880s in the countryside around his native Boston. In the mid-1890s, following four years of studying and working in France, Prendergast focused on shore and beach settings near home. From his first documented participation in a public exhibition, at the Boston Art Club in 1895, these works drew critics' praise and helped launch the artist's career. The following year, Prendergast's works were included in exhibitions not only in Boston but at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Art Institute of Chicago, the New York Water Color Club, and the Society of American Artists in New York.

Prendergast used sailing ships on open water as the backdrop in many of scenes of figures in landscapes, beginning with works made about the same time he painted Viewing the Ships, such as Telegraph Hill (TF 1992.110) and Telegraph Hill I (TF 1992.111), and as late as his Salem Willows (TF 1999.120) and The Grove (TF 1992.63). Viewing the Ships is unusual for Prendergast, however, in the static pose of the seated figures; the artist typically focused on figures in motion. In watercolors of this period, Prendergast sketched lightly in graphite to create a structure for his seemingly spontaneous application of watercolor in discrete strokes and blended washes of color. In the transparent strokes of color that form the woman's dress and hat, Prendergast made abundant use of the bright white of the untouched paper, leaving lines of white around the sleeves and bodice that reduce the figure to a series of rounded forms in a manner that was quickly becoming his signature style.

Impressionnistes Américains (American Impressionism), Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, Washington, D.C. (organizer). Venues: Musée du Petit Palais, Paris, France, March 30–May 30, 1982; National Gallery, East Berlin, Germany, June 15–July 25, 1982; Museum Moderner Kunst, Schweizergarten, Vienna, Austria, August 15–September 25, 1982; Art Museum, Bucharest, Romania, Socialist Republic, October 24–November 24, 1982; National Gallery, Sofia, Bulgaria, December 26, 1982–January 31, 1983. [exh. cat.]

A Proud Heritage: Two Centuries of American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 21–June 21, 1987. [exh. cat.]

Selections from the Permanent Collection: Life in 19th Century America, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, June 24–September 6, 1987.

The Work of Charles and Maurice Prendergast, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, March 16–April 21, 1991.

Rivières et rivages: les artistes américains, 1850–1900 (Waves and Waterways: American Perspectives, 1850–1900), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–October 31, 2000. [exh. cat.]

Maurice Prendergast: By the Sea, Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine (organizer). Venue: Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, Maine, June 29-October 13, 2013. [exh. cat.]

Beckelmann, Jurgen. "Der Sommer der Mary Cassatt." Welt (July 4, 1982): 4. Ill. p. 4.

McClelland, Donald R., Barbara Novak and Harold Spencer. Impressionnistes Américains (American Impressionism). (exh. cat., Smithsonian Traveling Exhibition Service). Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Traveling Exhibition Service, 1982. Ill. no. 41.

Atkinson, D. Scott et al. A Proud Heritage: Two Centuries of American Art. Edited by Terry A. Neff. (exh. cat., Terra Museum of American Art). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1987. Pl. T-111, p. 220 (color).

Clark, Carol, Nancy Mowll Mathews and Gwendolyn Owens. Maurice Brazil Prendergast; Charles Prendergast: A Catalogue Raisonné. Munich, Germany and Williamstown, Massachusetts: Prestel-Verlag and The President and Trustees of Williams College, 1990. No. 599, p. 352; ill. no. 599, p. 352 (black & white).

Homann, Joachim, Trevor J. Fairbrother, Nancy Mowill Mathews, Joseph J. Rishel and Richard J. Wattenmaker. Maurice Prendergast: By the Sea. (exh. cat., Bowdoin College Museum of Art). Brunswick, Maine: Bowdoin College Museum of Art and DelMonico Books, an imprint of Prestel Publishing, Munich, London and New York, 2013. Text p. 166; pl. 5, p. 39 (color).