South Street Seaport, New York City
40" x 30", Oil on canvas, 1994
Tom volunteered on the Pioneer for 125 hours to gain information to complete
this work. It started with a commission from his sister and brother-in-law
to paint two large 40" x 30" works for their home. Tom decided
to paint two water paintings, one of New York Harbor and another of Cincinnati
Harbor. He was still living in his apartment on Christopher Street in
Greenwich Village when he started so he started working on the layout
of the New York painting. He would comb the library for books on the seaport.
Day after day he would delve deeper and deeper into the books that were
not shelved in the public collection. He would have all the various folios
brought up from the stacks and page through them. Finally he found a image
to start from. It was a view of the southern pier of the South Street
Seaport taken from the tennis pier just south. Tom went down there and
started taking images of the scene. In the photo there was the Pioneer,
a 100 foot schooner and a Brigantine tied up on the end of the pier. He
then composed small sketches. He bolstered the main photograph with many
photographs of is own, ship plans and first hand experience on the schooner
"Pioneer." He used Canaletto and Jan Van der Heyden's style
to guide his brush manner. He wanted something free and easy but still
detailed. He believed he could achieve this by working with premixed color
applied wet on wet.
On this complicated piece he discovered a different approach for achieving
success. His strategy was to paint a full size, rough painting using a
slow drying oil applied with a palette knife. The thick color and vague
form could be scraped off and reapplied until the desired image was created.
This approach gave him the best form and color for the final work. For
eighteen months, he learned about the South Street Seaport Museum. The
painting depicts the early days of the museum. The iron schooner "Pioneer"
in the foreground is part of the museum, regularly providing tours of
New York Harbor. The Seaport Museum has a large volunteer operation and
Tom volunteered for general duty on board the "Pioneer." In
1885 she was the finest vessel available for collecting foundry sand.
She originally had one large mast for greater speed. The barkentine in
the background is the all wood "Regina Maris," built in the
1800's and now berthed in Greenport, Long Island. Her design followed
the clipper ships because she used a smaller crew and could sail closer
to the wind. In painting, Tom started with a fixed pencil sketch on the
canvas. Next, I painted the sky with slow drying oil because the buildings,
bridges and rigging must be painted before the sky dried. The work then
progressed by painting only the area he could finish in a day. As a builder
constructs in material, he constructed with color. Tom became what he
painted. Tom worked three to four hours on two square inches of the 30"
X 40" canvas and finished in five months. By the time he finished
the work he had moved out of New York City back to his home town of Cincinnati.
He had met the love of his life while on a hometown visit and she did
not want to New York City or travel the circuit of Palm Beach, NYC and
Nantucket that Tom had become accustomed to. Sadly his sister and brother
divorced and the painting was put up for auction. It was purchased by
Ron Steensland of Lexington, Kentucky.
Click on thumbnails to see detail
Studies for the painting
Seaport Study II, 5-1/2" x 4", ink on velum, 1994
Seaport Study I, 6" x 4-1/4", watercolor on paper, 1994
Seaport Study III, 5-1/2" x 4", watercolor on paper, 1994
