WHALER ATTACKING A SPERM WHALE, Charles Sidney Raleigh, 1877

THE BARK WASHINGTON, Artist unknown, 1860

In early 2025 the “Americana Week” preview exhibition at Christie’s featured a painting reminiscent of one in the OHS collection. Whaler Attacking a Sperm Whale by Charles Sidney Raleigh, depicts the drama and violence of hunting sperm whales, just like our painting The Bark Washington, which was last on view at Village House in the summer of 2023. Both paintings capture the power of the whale as it fights for its life, churning up waves, toppling the whalers’ rowboats, and flinging the men into the sea. (Unfortunately, The Bark Washington was stolen in 2001 and, if not for some good luck and the persistence of the FBI, our painting was eventually returned, thus avoiding winding up on the walls of an auction house, too!).

As for the rest of the Americana auction preview, time and again many of the pieces shown were reminiscent of ones in the OHS collection. An Antonio Jacobsen portrait of a tugboat had pride of place in a room full of notable American artists. Jacobsen, a prolific painter known for his flat and exacting style of depicting 19th century boats, is well-represented in OHS’s collection; we are fortunate to have four(!) Jacobsens, all on display at the Webb House Permanent Maritime exhibition. And in a gallery full of 19th century paintings Christie’s described as sublime, we thought of East Marion’s own romantic painter Joseph Henry Miller. We have an excellent example of his work, depicting brooding clouds over a grassy ravine, hung in Village House.

We are heartened to see that the OHS collections’ status as world-class is confirmed!