Artwork of the Week: December 9
Edward Moran almost exclusively painted seascapes. Often eclipsed by his brother, the famed landscape painter Thomas Moran, Edward’s artworks exemplify the sublime beauty of nature that was characteristic of the American Romantic movement. Moran composed a tragically realistic maritime composition that captured the often-inevitable consequences of treacherous waterways. Through careful brushwork and rich coloring, Moran’s painting evokes a solemn shipwreck at sea. His use of starkly contrasting blacks, whites, and yellows expresses the despair of the sunken ship. Dark clouds with penetrating rays draw attention to the mast that has crested just above the ocean’s surface. In the background we can see a distant lighthouse, though its view is obstructed by the chaos of the churning sea. Sunlight is present behind the cloaked sky, a signal of hope revealed just after the sinking of the ship. Edward Moran’s candid depiction emphasizes the unsettling majesty of the open ocean, its beautifully vast and dangerous waters claiming another victim.
You can experience this work firsthand in the MOA’s newest exhibition- Crossing the Divide: American Art from the Permanent Collection.
