Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
When I tried with cracked lips and swollen tongue to babble of what I had witnessed, he called me a liar and threw stones at me so that I had to crawl into a crevice in the rocks to dodge the missiles.
Alternate Title(s):Two Men in Rough Surf
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: 1914
Dimensions:
29 1/4 × 56 1/8 in. (74.3 × 142.6 cm)
The Kelly Collection of American Illustration
Accession number: SUPP2000.478
Research Number: NCW: 478
InscribedLower left: N. C. WYETH (underlined)
ProvenancePhilip A. Budrose, Marblehead, MA, ? until mid-1970s; (?); (Coe Kerr Galleries, New York, NY, 1990); (Christies, New York, NY, May 22, 1991, lot no. 201, as "Two Men in Rough Surf")
Exhibition HistoryAshland, VA, Randolph-Macon College, "Howard Pyle and His Students: Works from the Kelly Collection of American Illustration," 7 Oct.-9 Dec. 1995, no. 31, b/w illustration (unpaginated); Washington, D.C., Federal Reserve System, "Art of the Illustrator, Works from the Kelly Collection of American Illustration," 2 June-28 Nov. 1997, no. 34 p. 21; Rockland, ME, 1998, no. 71 p. 165, color illustration p. 71
References
Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, 1972), p. 255; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), I.550, p. 300
Curatorial Remarks"I have a picture of unusual power on my easle....Have had a great time painting the surf and two half drowned, half crazed men fighting in the spume" (NCW to Andrew Newell Wyeth, "I'm directing this letter to you..." and dated in another hand "Nov. 18, 1914?", Wyeth Family Archives). Filed immediately after the letter is a snapshot of this painting on an easel in the artist's main studio, with NCW 1425 propped against the easel stand; both paintings are framed with dark moldings.
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:Transparency directly from painting
Photo Credit:Courtesy of Christie's