Point Judith, Rhode Island (1867–68): Art, History and Details

Point Judith, Rhode Island (1867–68) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Martin Johnson Heade (American, 1819–1904).

The work and its context

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

One of only a handful of nocturnal scenes painted by Heade, this evocative painting captures the effects of glimmering moonlight on land, sea, and sky. Although the artist depicts a specific location, his nighttime rendering shrouds most details in shadow, imparting a greater sense of mood than place. Human presence manifests itself through two sailing ships on the left side of the composition.

Object facts

• Title: Point Judith, Rhode Island
• Date: 1867–68
• Creator attribution: Martin Johnson Heade (American, 1819–1904)
• Culture: United States
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on canvas
• Dimensions: Framed: 97 x 153.5 x 14 cm (38 3/16 x 60 7/16 x 5 1/2 in.); Unframed: 72.3 x 128 cm (28 7/16 x 50 3/8 in.)
• Collection: American - Painting
• Department: American Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1970.161

A detail from the museum

Home to Point Judith, the beach town of Narragansett has its population double during summertime.

Collection credit

Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund and Gift of Delbert Gutridge in memory of Orrel A. Parker by exchange

Further reading listed by the museum

• Stebbins, Theodore E., Martin Johnson Heade, Janet L. Comey, and Karen E. Quinn. The Life and Work of Martin Johnson Heade: A Critical Analysis and Catalogue Raisonné. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000.
• “A Check List. American Paintings and Water Colors of the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Early Twentieth Centuries in the Cleveland Museum of Art.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 60, no. 1 (January 1973): 21–35.
• Talbot, William S. “Landscape and Light.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 60, no. 1 (January 1973): 9–20.

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.