Holiday on the Hudson (c. 1912): Art, History and Details

Holiday on the Hudson (c. 1912) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is George Luks (American, 1866–1933).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

A sun-dappled scene of middle-class leisure, Holiday on the Hudson is an atypical work by Luks, who more often turned to gritty tenement subjects for inspiration. Throughout his career, the painter fashioned himself as a brash, profane, and hard-drinking antagonist to New York’s genteel art-world establishment. The museum purchased this work just four months before the artist was beaten to death in the wake of a speakeasy argument.

Object facts

• Title: Holiday on the Hudson
• Date: c. 1912
• Creator attribution: George Luks (American, 1866–1933)
• Culture: America
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on canvas
• Dimensions: Framed: 96.5 x 111.5 x 6 cm (38 x 43 7/8 x 2 3/8 in.); Unframed: 76.2 x 91.7 cm (30 x 36 1/8 in.)
• Collection: American - Painting
• Department: American Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1933.2291

A detail from the museum

Luks often boasted about being an amateur boxing champion, but this was later revealed to be a tall tale.

Collection credit

Hinman B. Hurlbut Collection

Further reading listed by the museum

• C. Owen Lublin, "Arts and Decoration," Town and Country (1 February 1916), vol. 39.
• New York, C.W. Kraushaar Art Galleries, An Important Collection of Paintings and Bronzes by Modern Masters of American and European Art (December 3–December 31, 1921)
• Francis, Henry S. "Memorial Note on a Picture by George Luks." The Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art XXXIII, no.1 (January, 1934): 6-8.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.