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Collections

Winslow Homer
The Cotton Pickers1876

On view:
Geffen Galleries, Transatlantic Exchange and Its Legacies
Oil painting of two young Black women carrying baskets and sacks of cotton through a wide field under a pale overcast sky
Artist or Maker
Winslow Homer
United States, Massachusetts, Boston, 1836-1910
Title
The Cotton Pickers
Place Made
United States
Date Made
1876
Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
Canvas: 24 1/16 × 38 1/8 in. (61.12 × 96.84 cm) Frame: 35 1/4 × 49 1/2 × 4 in. (89.54 × 125.73 × 10.16 cm)
Credit Line
Acquisition made possible through Museum Trustees: Robert O. Anderson, R. Stanton Avery, B. Gerald Cantor, Edward W. Carter, Justin Dart, Charles E. Ducommun, Camilla Chandler Frost, Julian Ganz, Jr., Dr. Armand Hammer, Harry Lenart, Dr. Franklin D. Murphy, Mrs. Joan Palevsky, Richard E. Sherwood, Maynard J. Toll, and Hal B. Wallis
Accession Number
M.77.68
Classification
Paintings
Collecting Area
American Art
Curatorial Notes

Two female plantation workers stand in a field of cotton, their upright figures a symbol of their strength against the soft white fibers that surround them. Winslow Homer painted this narrative after the American Civil War with the hope that former slaves might have a better future now that they were free.

Provenance

The artist, 1876-77 § Private collection, England, 1877-1911 § Dr. Charles B. Guinn, Carthage, Mo., 1911-44 § With Wildenstein & Co., New York, 1944-47 § James Cox Bandy II, New York, c. 1947-71 § Mrs. James Cox Bandy II (by descent), New Jersey, 1971-77.

Selected Bibliography
  • Kelly, Simon and Maite van Dijk, eds. Millet and Modern Art: From Van Gogh to Dalí. Amsterdam: Van Gogh Museum; St. Louis: Saint Louis Art Museum, 2019.
  • Herdrich, Stephanie L. and Sylvia Yount. Winslow Homer: Crosscurrents. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2022.
  • Arabindan-Kesson, Anna. Black Bodies, White Gold: Art, Cotton, and Commerce in the Atlantic World. Durham: Duke University Press, 2021.
  • Stebbins, Jr., Theodore E., Carol Troyen, and Trevor J. Fairbrother. A New World: Masterpieces of American Painting, 1760-1910. Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1983.