Skip to main content
Exhibition History“The River: People and Places,” The American Federation of Arts, New York, NY, April 22 – October 31, 1964.
“American Ship Portraits and Marine Painting of the 19th Century,” Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse NY, January 4 – February 28, 1970.
"Alexander Hamilton,” Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, OH, September 25 – November 15, 1992.
BibliographyAmbrose, Douglas, Your Obedient Servant: The Letters of Alexander Hamilton & Aaron Burr (Cooperstown, NY: Fenimore Art Museum, 2019), p. 11, ill
Artist
Edmund C. Coates
(1816 - 1871)
View of New York Harbor
Date1837-1847
MediumOil on canvas
DimensionsSight: 44 3/4 × 64 7/8 in. (113.7 × 164.8 cm)
Object numberN0197.1961
Credit LineCollection of the Fenimore Art Museum. Gift of Stephen C. Clark
Photograph by Richard Walker
Label TextThis is an unusually large landscape painting, perhaps the largest in Coates' work. It was originally painted as a view of the Hamilton-Burr dueling ground in Weehawken, New Jersey. Just across the Hudson River from Manhattan, the area was a popular and fashionable spot for excursions from the city in the 1830s. The painting is dated twice - 1837 and 1847. Because of pentimenti, particularly a large tree that originally blocked the view, it seems as if Coates' first intention was to depict the site of the duel. The tree was later painted out - presumably in 1847 - and the vista opened up to depict a view of the entrance to New York harbor. More, if not all, the figures were added at this time.
Although the scene was a popular one and reproduced in a number of prints, the perspective and details are distinctive enough to suggest that Coates did not derive the composition from printed sources but made the sketches himself. He includes a broad sweep from the Battery and the tip of Manhattan to the Narrows and the shores of Staten Island. An ambitious work, the painting is broadly painted without the detail and subtle shifts of color that the Hudson River School was using so effectively at this time. This is probably the reason Coates never achieved much recognition in his own day and is so little known today. This view, however, effectively captures the scale and breadth of New York harbor, and demonstrates why it was so popular with the art world and maritime trade alike.Exhibition History“The River: People and Places,” The American Federation of Arts, New York, NY, April 22 – October 31, 1964.
“American Ship Portraits and Marine Painting of the 19th Century,” Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse NY, January 4 – February 28, 1970.
"Alexander Hamilton,” Ohio Historical Society, Columbus, OH, September 25 – November 15, 1992.
BibliographyAmbrose, Douglas, Your Obedient Servant: The Letters of Alexander Hamilton & Aaron Burr (Cooperstown, NY: Fenimore Art Museum, 2019), p. 11, ill
On View
Not on viewc. 1850-1900
1949
c. 1940
Related Object/Related Object
