loading 
Fitz Henry Lane
HISTORICAL ARCHIVE • CATALOGUE RAISONNÉ • EDUCATIONAL RESOURCE
An online project under the direction of the CAPE ANN MUSEUM
An online project under the direction of the CAPE ANN MUSEUM
Catalog entry
|
inv. 270
New York Yacht Club Regatta (2)
1856 Oil on canvas 28 x 48 1/8 in. (71.1 x 122.2 cm) No inscription found
|
Related Work in the Catalog
Provenance (Information known to date; research ongoing.)
Maxim Karolik, Newport, R.I.
The Shelburne Museum, Vt., 1961
Exhibition History
DeCordova Museum, Lincoln, Massachusetts, Fitz Hugh Lane: The First Major Exhibition, March 20–April 17, 1966., no. 42.
Traveled to: Colby College Art Museum, Waterville, Maine, 30–6, 1966.
Traveled to: Colby College Art Museum, Waterville, Maine, 30–6, 1966.
Vero Beach Museum of Art, Vero Beach, Florida, Ships and Shorelines: William Bradford and Nineteenth-Century American Marine Painting, January 30–May 30, 2010.
Published References
The American Neptune, Pictorial Supplement VII: A Selection of Marine Paintings by Fitz Hugh Lane, 1804–1865. Salem, MA: The American Neptune, 1965., plate XXII, no. 79. ⇒ includes 
text
text
Wilmerding, John. Fitz Hugh Lane: The First Major Exhibition. Lincoln, MA: De Cordova Museum; in association with Colby College Art Museum, 1966., no. 42. ⇒ includes text
text
Wilmerding, John. A History of American Marine Painting. Salem, MA: Peabody Museum; in association with Little, Brown and Co., 1968.
Wilmerding, John. Fitz Hugh Lane. New York: Praeger, 1971.
Muller, Nancy C. Paintings and Drawings at the Shelburne Museum. Shelburne, VT: Shelburne Museum, 1976., no. 192.
Wilmerding, John. American Views: Essays on American Art. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991.
Commentary
Of Lane’s four known depictions of the New York Yacht Club Regatta at New Bedford (August 8, 1856), this view appears to be second in sequence. The four paintings include this work, New York Yacht Club Regatta (1), 1856 (inv. 66), New York Yacht Club Regatta (3), After 1856 (inv. 396), and New York Yacht Club Regatta (4), 1857 (inv. 397).The starting gun at 10:50 am signaled all participants (anchored at the starting line) to raise sail, the third class (smallest vessels) to start first. At 10:55 am, the second gun signaled the second class to proceed, as is depicted in this painting. Some of the first (largest) class are still raising sail, while the large sloop in the foreground is jogging, waiting for the third gun at 11:00 a.m.
In this painting, Lane was off the Fairhaven shore, looking west toward New Bedford on the far shore, the heart of the city to the far right. The rural peninsula stretching south to Clark’s Point is largely hidden. The committee boat (schooner “Emblem”) is anchored near the beacon (not visible) marking the west side of the harbor channel. The starting line extends from there, south-westerly, to Butler’s Flats. The yachts under way at far left are close-hauled, sailing south-south-east to the harbor entrance, then tack to the south-west until off Clark’s Point. From there it will be a long leg south-south-east, close-hauled, to Naushon Island and another long tack westward.
The strong breeze and choppy sea are very typical of summer sailing conditions in Buzzards Bay, and Lane has depicted them without exaggeration. So skillfully are they shown in this series of paintings that there should be few if any reservations about his ability to depict weather and seas in unfamiliar coastal locations.
Erik Ronnberg