Universally appealing, this narrative vista of the main channel in Venice is a brilliant, bright work, with palatial estates, people at leisure and the marine vessels upon the water. The water holds flashes of color, some kelp blooms and indifferent seabirds, while people in elegant and casual dress stroll the broad concourse walkway. A renown painter of Venice, Antonio Maria de Reyna Manescau knew the environs very well, familiar with the architectural as well as the nautical details of his adoptive home city.

A large square-rigged sailing ship dominates in size the anchored gondolas, and other ships while a small row boat with two marines slides by. The architectural detail of the buildings suggests opulence and the grand age of the Mediterranean City-State, the scale well illustrating the distance across. The anchored gondolas and bright sunlight indicate that it’s midday, with the coming afternoon, activity will increase on the principle waterway.

The panoramic sensibility of Reyna’s painting mark this work as a special one in his extensive output of originals. Born a Spaniard, he spent most of his artistic life in Venice, and knew well the locations of Venice full of beauty and character he depicts. This great example is in perfect condition to illustrate his scenic mastery. The subject of his artistry and admiration in the city itself, captured in a desirable broad horizontal view.

An early view of the Western Trading Port of Shanghai, opened in 1843 as part of the Treaty of Nanking, American mariners communicate with a merchant from their vessels on the river. The broker’s ship is loaded with bundled packages of tea, while at times less savory goods would be available at outer islands and less official ports. Among the commodities brought into China was a rather abundant opium supply from India, with tea and silver the primary exports.

Dominating the eye along the riverbank, the Chinese Customs House shows the nation’s traditional architectural style, with the yellow-titled roof indicating an allegiance with the Chinese Emperor, alongside several warehouses and residences of prominent 19th Century Western merchants. Numerous people walk the wharf, and most are identifiable by the style of their hats, including one Western business man in the center holding a cane. The American mariners in the sloop display the national flag and are possibly finishing a negotiation with the merchant with Chinese sailors at the oars, a servant at his side in his boat. A cutter sloop and a schooner are also on the water, while a well-dressed man rides in his rowed boat powered by to oarsmen in stark red uniform apparel with wide-brimmed white hats.

The scenic atmosphere completes this fine work with the emerald water quite still and the rising clouds filling the bright, daytime sky. This helps illuminate the delicate touches to the buildings, including the different colors of the balcony rails and slight variations of design. An original carved Chinese Chippendale frame completes this historic Chinese painting.

This striking view of the Scottish waterway near Greenock on the Firth of Clyde is full of notable details making the location come alive two centuries after it was painted. Paintings by Robert Salmon are desirable the world over, due to the impressive amount of historic subject matter and detail presented through artistic composition and light qualities of the highest order.

The blend of multiple subjects brought together in a composition backed by the dramatic heights of the coastal hills, the elevations near Kilcreggan between Helensburgh and Dunoon, is made perfect with the glowing variation of light Salmon casts through the sky. Fisherfolk prepare their sails and boat on the foreground rocks, north of the important port of Greenock. From this central waterway junction, several sea lochs are accessible, including nearby Gare Loch, Long Loch and Holy Loch, where much of the British World War II submarine forces where built and stationed. In this narrative scene 150 years prior, a large British cutter dominates, with another sailing near and other vessels under sail and waiting.

Salmon’s superb rendering of the luminous cloudy sky with thin streaks slicing the sky shows the rare sunny calm of the location and day. His work with detailed for ground and fading depth is masterful, and easy to see where his artistic style influenced so many great American artists after him. His human portrayals, especially the barefoot woman holding the water jug and the man with the anchor rope, complete the scene.

A scene from a period of changing prosperity for rural America, Xanthus Smith has assembled a winning composition within this large canvas capturing a moment along a eastern riverbank. The depth and changing hues of the foliage suggest it is late summer, and the elevated mill and house along the bank are reminiscent of structures through Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. Smith himself was native to Pennsylvania, and the rising mountain elevations could easily be in his home state, with 116 mills listed in the register of historic buildings of the “Virtue, Liberty and Independence” state.

The serenity of the scene is pleasing and tranquil, except perhaps for the effort to comfort the horses for the short pole-ferry ride across the calm river. Two women in fine dress are seated, while the men make ready, and a family outside the mill waits their visitors. Another ferryman sits at leisure on the close bank, near the remnant of a derelict hull’s timbers.

Interesting textures appear throughout this work by Smith, especially looking at the twisting tree trunk and the aged construction of the multi-storied mill structures. The overall panorama is a perfect view of the wide expanse of the seasonal nature of the location. The clear, bright light allows for the reflective river surface to shine. With much of the American population gathering in her larger cities, places such as this would soon be served by road, bridges and trains. The swimming waterfowl ducks don’t seem to mind it as it once was.

The net fishermen of Rockport, in an array of a lobster boat, yawls of colorful hues and a seaworthy white rowed boat, work aboard their crafts in the chill morning light. Local onlookers fill the scene, and the conversations over coffee would drift from fishing to social affair and politics back to fishing. The work becomes of blend of the things Thieme is known for artistically; his professional handling of light and shadow, strong natural coloration and great impasto application of his oil to canvas.

Silent and serene, the water holds on to Thieme’s special ability to portray wet reflections and the soft tidal sensation of slow movement in the harbor. No power boat wake pushing through the soft light that mutes the distance across the harbor, as the sea birds glide above. Most heads are down, looking at the tasks at hand, or just keeping a close eye on the others.

Thieme’s wife, Becky, once wrote of her husband “he often says that he was born 50 years to late”. Thieme longed for simpler times amid the march of progress. He worked relentlessly at his art, and became one of the premier, internationally recognized members of the Cape Ann and Rockport schools of art. He owned a reputation for establishing friendly relationships with locals and visitors alike, but would tolerate no interruptions while working at a canvas. Here, just across from “Motif #1”, the pier-side Red Building that appears in many Cape Ann paintings, as significant to Rockport as Thieme himself is today.