West India Divers, Winslow Homer

Artwork Overview

Winslow Homer, West India Divers
Winslow Homer, West India Divers
Winslow Homer
West India Divers
1899
Winslow Homer
1836–1910
West India Divers, 1899
Where object was made: Nassau, Bahamas
Material/technique: wove paper; watercolor; scraping; chalk
Dimensions:
Image Dimensions Height/Width (Height x Width): 38.1 x 54.4 cm
Image Dimensions Height/Width (Height x Width): 15 x 21 7/16 in
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 38.1 x 54.4 cm
Sheet/Paper Dimensions (Height x Width): 15 x 21 7/16 in
Frame Dimensions (Height x Width x Depth): 25 x 31 1/2 x 3 in
Weight (Weight): 15 lbs
Credit line: William Bridges Thayer Memorial
Accession number: 1928.1785
Not on display
Add to portfolio

If you wish to reproduce this image, please submit an image request

Images

Label texts

Spencer Museum of Art Highlights
Homer produced this watercolor while visiting the Bahamas between December 1898 and February 1899. The watercolors Homer created during this visit emphasize the native population’s involvement in daily tasks such as diving for conch.
Civic Leader and Art Collector: Sallie Casey Thayer and an Art Museum for KU
The late 19th-century tourism industry began promoting the Bahamas as a destination for affluent North Americans. Winslow Homer initially visited the islands on commission from Century Magazine in 1884–1885 to illustrate an article called “A Midwinter Resort.” During his second visit to the Bahamas in the winter of 1898–1899, Homer painted at least 25 watercolors. Like this one, many of these paintings focused on black Bahamian men and boys engaged in subsistence activities such as harvesting conch shells. Such scenes presented tropicalized images of “locals” and their “daily life” to white viewers and collectors in the United States, such as Sallie Casey Thayer. They seemed removed from increasingly industrialized urban centers like Kansas City.
Civic Leader and Art Collector: Sallie Casey Thayer and an Art Museum for KU
The late 19th-century tourism industry began promoting the Bahamas as a destination for affluent North Americans. Winslow Homer initially visited the islands on commission from Century Magazine in 1884–1885 to illustrate an article called “A Midwinter Resort.” During his second visit to the Bahamas in the winter of 1898–1899, Homer painted at least 25 watercolors. Like this one, many of these paintings focused on black Bahamian men and boys engaged in subsistence activities such as harvesting conch shells. Such scenes presented tropicalized images of “locals” and their “daily life” to white viewers and collectors in the United States, such as Sallie Casey Thayer. They seemed removed from increasingly industrialized urban centers like Kansas City. Sallie Casey Thayer purchased three works by Winslow Homer for her collection. The watercolor West India Divers and oil painting Cloud Shadows came from Young’s Art Galleries in Chicago, and the watercolor Among the Oaks from the Macbeth Gallery in New York. Both galleries featured watercolors and paintings by American artists, and Young’s was one of the few Chicago galleries that actively supported Homer’s work. Thayer acquired West India Divers in May 1910, just months before Homer’s death. She then acquired Cloud Shadows two years later, in February 1912, and Among the Oaks in March 1913. Her acquisitions came at a time when collectors, critics, scholars, and museums hailed Homer as a distinctive and prominent American artist. Along with the artworks, Thayer bought the contemporary biography The Life and Works of Winslow Homer (1911) by William Howe Downes. While reviewing the memorial exhibition shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1911, A. E. Gallatin, a well-known critic, curator, collector, and artist, endorsed Homer’s art as “typically American,” and the artist, “in many respects…the most representative painter that this country has produced.” Tap the image above and swipe to view details of West India Divers. Tap the Related icon to view two other Homer works on display in the exhibition.
Google Art Project
Homer produced this watercolor while visiting the Bahamas between December 1898 and February 1899. The watercolors Homer created during this visit emphasize the native population’s involvement in daily tasks such as diving for conch.

Exhibitions

Soundings: Making Culture at Sea
Celka Straughn, curator
CuratedByVoc, curator
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1953–1954
Civic Leader and Art Collector: Sallie Casey Thayer and an Art Museum for KU
Celka Straughn, curator
2017–2018
Watercolors by Winslow Homer: The Color of Light
Martha Tedeschi, curator
2008
Winslow Homer
1995–1996
Winslow Homer Watercolors
1986
Winslow Homer Watercolors
1986
Winslow Homer Watercolors
1986
Winslow Homer Watercolors
1986
Sallie Casey Thayer and Her Collection
Carol Shankel, curator
1977
Winslow Homer Exhibition
1973
Winslow Homer Exhibition
1973
American Drawings and Watercolors
1973
Winslow Homer
1973
Winslow Homer Exhibition
1973
From the Collection of the University of Kansas
1971
Winslow Homer's Sub-Tropical America
1968
Art of the United States: 1670-1966
1966
Winslow Homer at Prout's Neck
1966
Winslow Homer Retrospective
1963
Winslow Homer A Retropsective Exhibition
1959
Winslow Homer A Retropsective Exhibition
1958–1959
Winslow Homer A Retropsective Exhibition
1958–1959
Nineteenth Century American Painting (19th Century American Painting)
1954

Citations

Youle, Randolph A., and John W. Ittmans, Charles C. Eldredge. From the Collection of the University of Kansas Museum of Art, April 15 - June 13, 1971. Houston: The Museum of Fine Arts Houston, 1971.

Broun, Elizabeth. Handbook of the Collection: Helen Foresman Spencer Museum of Art. Lawrence, Kansas: Spencer Museum of Art, The University of Kansas, 1978.

Norris, Andrea. "Sanford Gifford: A Discovery Joins a University Collection." In American Art Review Vol. 8, no. 1 (1996):

Stokstad, Marilyn, ed. The Handbook of the Museum of Art. Lawrence, Kansas: The University of Kansas, 1962.

Shankel, Carol. Sallie Casey Thayer and Her Collection. Lawrence, Kansas: The University of Kansas Museum of Art, 1976.

Spencer Museum of Art, The University of Kansas. The Register of the Spencer Museum of Art: Special Anniversary Issue, 1978 V, no. 5 (1978):

Tedeschi, Martha. Watercolors by Winslow Homer: The Color of Light. Verona, Italy: Yale University Press, 2008.

Ballinger, James, David Curry, Marietta Gapu, Marilyn Kindred, Reed Malm, Carla White, and Charles C. Eldredge. American Drawings and Watercolors. Lawrence, Kansas: The University of Kansas Museum of Art, 1973.

Brooking, Dolo, and Leni Salkind. Art-ful Boxes. Lawrence, Kansas: The University of Kansas Museum of Art, 1976.

Adams, Henry, and Margaret Stenz. American Drawings and Watercolors from the Kansas City Region. Kansas City, Missouri: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1992.

Gardner, Albert Ten Eyck. Winslow Homer: A Retrospective Exhibition. Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 1958.

Straughn, Celka. "Complexities of Americanism and Race: Winslow Homer's West India Divers." In Perspectives on a Legacy Collection: Sallie Casey Thayer’s Gift to the University of Kansas (2020): 390–413.

Herdrich, Stephanie L., and Sylvia Yount. Winslow Homer: Crosscurrents. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2022.