The Rapids, Hudson River, Adirondacks, 1894 Transparent
watercolor, with traces of opaque watercolor, blotting, and
scraping, over graphite, on thick, rough-textured, ivory wove
paper 384 x 546 mm Signed recto, lower left, in pen and brown
ink: "Hudson River/June 1894 W.H." Inscribed verso, center, in
graphite: "M.K.W.C. 1018-//The Rapids, Hudson River Adirondacks"
Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. Ryerson Collection, 1933.1250 By the time
Homer first began visiting the Adirondacks in the 1870s,
commercial logging operations in the region were beginning to
destroy large tracts of forest and to clog the rivers. He
acutely observed and recorded these events in his watercolors,
rarely passing explicit judgment. In The Rapids, Hudson River,
Adirondacks, the artist combined themes of fishing and logging.
On first encounter, this watercolor is peaceful and intimate, a
virtuoso study of the movement of the river’s surface over
partially submerged rocks. Long, painterly strokes of black
watercolor over layers of blue describe t