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Black and white illustration depicting a well-dressed couple in a carriage by the seaside.
  • Black and white illustration depicting a well-dressed couple in a carriage by the seaside.

Winslow Homer

Our Watering-Places—The Empty Sleeve at Newport
Now On View

Maker

Winslow Homer (American, 1836-1910)
Harper&#039

Culture

American

Title

Our Watering-Places—The Empty Sleeve at Newport

Year

1865

Medium

  • Wood engraving on paper

Materials/Techniques

Techniques

  • Wood engraving on paper

Materials

wood engraving

Supports

  • medium weight cream wove paper

Dimensions

Image: 23.5 x 35.2 cm (9 1/4 x 13 7/8 inches)

Signature / Inscription / Marks

Original--Verso:in pencil in LL:52.298In Plate--Under image in letterpress:OUR WATERING-PLACES--THE ENPTY SLEEVE AT NEWPORT.--[SEE PAGE 534.]; along right edge:532 HARPER'S WEEKLY.[AUGUST 26, 1865

Marks: Stamped in brown ink on verso:R.I.S.D./MUSEUM/OF ART surrounded by PROVIDENCE/RHODE ISLAND (all inscribed in a circle)

Credit / Object Number

Credit

Museum Works of Art Fund

Object Number

52.298

Type

  • Prints

Exhibition History

Process Work
Intersections of Photography and Print ca. 1825 to Today
Feb 01, 2025 – Jul 20, 2025

Label copy

American artist Winslow Homer began his career as a newspaper artist, producing illustrations of current events from railroad accidents to shifting social dynamics in the aftermath of the Civil War. By 1865, publications like Harper’s Weekly, which regularly printed Homer’s work, sold at least 100,000 copies every week, making their weekly readership upwards of half a million people. 

For one of Homer’s drawings to appear in print, it was first transferred onto a woodblock, then manually carved by an engraver working in a large commercial workshop. This time-consuming process was not very conducive to the rapid pace of the news cycle. To speed up production, large woodblocks were often cut into smaller pieces so multiple engravers could work on the same image at the same time. The gaps between woodblocks often remain visible in these final prints. Ironically, in the example at right, a gap cuts across a Civil War veteran's shoulder near the site of his amputation. 

Image use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use.

Public Domain This object is in the Public Domain and available under a CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication

Tombstone

Winslow Homer (American, 1836-1910)
Harper's Weekly, publisher
Our Watering-Places—The Empty Sleeve at Newport, 1865
Wood engraving on paper
Image: 23.5 x 35.2 cm (9 1/4 x 13 7/8 inches)
Museum Works of Art Fund 52.298

To request new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

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