James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834–1903)
Coast Scene, Bathers
INV-1430
James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834–1903)1884–85
Coast Scene, Bathers
James McNeill Whistler (American, 1834–1903) →ImpressionismModernismpaintingamerican arts
Date
1884–85
Medium
Oil on panel
Dimensions
13.3 × 21.9 cm (5 1/4 × 8 5/8 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Walter S. Brewster Collection
In this intimately scaled seascape, James McNeill Whistler employed the sparest of compositional elements to evoke a coastal atmosphere. Broad horizontal bands of blues and gray suggest sky, ocean, and sand, with dabs of thin pigment giving economical, yet expressive form to around a dozen figures on the windswept beach. Whistler dedicated much of his artistic practice to capturing the mood and color harmonies of marine scenes. Coast Scene, Bathers was painted en plein air, a practice to which the artist returned in the 1880s. It marked a distinctive shift from his studio-produced Nocturnes of the previous decade.
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