"Light at Two Lights" by Edward Hopper (1882-1967), painted at Truro on Massachusetts' Cape Cod in 1927, is a classic example of American Realism. The crisp white of the structural mass in the foreground conveys a stolid, protective power against the pale blue summer sky. The painting's aura of introspective isolation is felt throughout Hopper's works.
"Easterly" by Andrew Wyeth (1919-2009), a watercolor rendering of a beloved Maine landmark, showcases this legendary American artist's exquisite eye for minute detail that is almost photographic in its focused intensity. The image is so
striking that the viewer can almost smell the salt air and hear the cry of gulls just out of sight.
Childe Hassam (1859-1935), one of America's most revered watercolor artists of the popular Impressionist Movement founded by French master Claude Monet, is the painter of "Afterglow, Gloucester Harbor," also known as "The Ten Pound Light." Painted at dusk, with the sky above the far hills still aflame with embers of the recent sunset, the harbor is veiled in the blue of gathering evening. The tiny lighthouse at the right is barely suggested in the Impressionist manner with its light
represented by a dot of bright yellow in the misted blue.
"The Brother's Light" by Rex Brandt (1914-2000) is an excellent representation of the "California School" of watercolor painting, which relished bold use of color and freedom of line. A noted author of books on the art of watercolor and painting teacher, Brandt was chosen as one of the prominent practitioners of the California Movement to be showcased at the 1939 World's Fair in New York. "The Brother's Light" has a youthful exuberance and coloration typical of this school of watercolors.