Passing off of the Storm

John Frederick Kensett

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Inspired by his view from Contentment Island, near Darien, Connecticut, "Passing Off of the Storm" is a masterful example of the artist’s series known as his “Last Summer’s Work.” Kensett chose an unusually wide format for the small painting and provided no framing devices to mark the edges of the composition. Showing extreme sensitivity to gradations of tone, he applied broad areas of pure color interrupted only by subtle brushstrokes, such as those representing four diagonal reeds or markers in the left half of the canvas, a rowboat in the foreground, a tiny island, several white sailboats, and a very slight white wave or reflection on the otherwise placid surface of the water.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art