How does this artwork elucidate its Painting?
For its "restrained color and extraordinary composition" the painting's debt to Japanese art has been noted by art historians. It has been compared to avian subjects by Okyo Maruyama, Hiroshige, and Hokusai, and was included in a major Japonisme exhibition in Paris in 1988. As well, it resembles John James Audubon's plate Golden-Eye Duck.
Against the tradition of birds painted as dead still life objects, Right and Left is unique for its depiction of the very moment of death. Despite their rapid movement, the birds are seen as if frozen in a snapshot, and the viewer is literally afforded a bird's eye view, in the line of the hunter's fire. Though the painting represents violent action, its formal aesthetic is that of sharply focused detachment, and has been described by Nicolai Cikovsky, Jr. of the National Gallery of Art as "a staggeringly beautiful and almost oriental arrangement of birds--just abstract shapes against bands of the subtlest cream and grey".The design consists of four horizontal bands of sea and sky which are connected by a series of vertical and diagonal shapes formed by the ducks' bodies— the one at left (male) struggling to ascend, its partner in a similar position but turned 90 degrees, already falling limp— and wave crests. Additionally, the birds' webbed feet and beaks and the boat's bow repeat the jagged contours of the waves. Half hidden, the hunters occupy an ambiguous position, and it is uncertain whether the line above them denotes the horizon or a fog bank. Atop this line is the rim of the sun, depicted as a red sliver. At the right is a stray feather which "serves as an exclamation point for the whole composition."The painting was received by Knoedler & Co. gallery in New York by January 30, 1909, and was described by the gallery as The Golden Eye or Whistler Duck.  According to Downes the painting was initially exhibited without Homer's having titled it, and received its name from a hunter who shouted appreciatively "Right and left!", the term for a rifleman's accomplishment in taking down two birds in quick succession with a double-barreled shotgun. Upon viewing the painting in New York, its first owner, Randal Morgan, asked several questions regarding Homer's intent: he inquired as to the direction of the largest wave, and the cause of the disturbance in the water at the front of the picture, which he believed was the impetus for the ducks' movement to leave their feeding. The questions were forwarded to the artist, but his reply is unknown. On August 3, 1909 Morgan bought the painting for $5,000, $4,000 of which went to Homer.
still life Japonisme Knoedler National Gallery of Art Hokusai Hiroshige Knoedler & Co. left Okyo Maruyama John James Audubon Japanese art double-barreled shotgun