For ocean going folk, whether for work, sport, for travel or leisure, or for that indescribable love of the largest body of water on our planet, the art on the subject of all things oceanic has the same magnetic allure ascribed to the moon’s pull on this great expanse of nature that graces the earth.
Georges Braque gets the lighting just right in this moody and painterly stone lithograph Boat on a Shore in Brittany— the dramatic sky, the solo gull and the soft after-storm glow strike such a perfect chord that this sea scene is nearly audible.
Italian artist Franco Costa is well known for his sailboat racing poster designs, his stylized flat shapes calling an atmosphere of nostalgia and modernism that is timeless. These two silkscreens, Sail Pool Swedenfrom 1982 and Keep Our Air Clean from the 1987 America’s Cup, both signed, describe the gliding and weightless joy of boat racing.
Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, a master poster designer who maintained every ounce of painter’s talent in his brilliant advertisements, conjures that fresh salt sea air and the inspiring, listing sensation of travel by boat. This 1966 Mourlot-printed stone lithograph La Passagere du 54 or Salon des Cent almost lends the feeling of sun and wind on the skin.
Wayland Moore captures a familiar moment in a sea so tumultuous the horizon disappears below the swell— this 1986 silkscreen Windsurferhighlights the thrill of working a vessel seaworthy enough to manage.
And if boats get your blood flowing, then the boatbuilding designs of Sparkman & Stephens must surely be eye candy, displaying the inner workings of how these beautiful constructions are arranged. Design No. 125 1947 Modified Sail Plan and Design No. 711 Cabin Construction of Bolero are both signed silkscreens from 1980.
In Woman Walking Along the Beach, a 1978 silkscreen by an unknown artist, the blue-hued color palette suggests seaside reflections and the strong breeze practically tears across one’s own clothing, referencing the romantic, sunbleached, daydreamy atmosphere that accompanies life on the beach.
Winslow Homer is modern art’s king of describing the sea, his fine-detail high realism somehow still rich with all the shades of emotion that the sea contains— of drama and tragedy, romance and striking beauty, to fully paint the personalities of such a beast is no small feat. The boat he paints in one of his most famed and iconic works Breezing Up is from none other than Gloucester, the place that inspired The Perfect Storm, and this piece Watching The Breakers reveals no less than his best with its disquieting performance.
And submerging under the depths can lead to discoveries of the mysterious realms of coral reefs and the colorful sealife inhabiting them. Delicate yet bold, arrangements like this Untitled etching by Richard Royce or The King of the Sea (Elvis), a signed silkscreen by Doug Auld envision the teeming worlds that are in constant motion around us all the time, an enrapturing harmony.
