Kissing the Moon
Winslow Homer, 1904
Three men in a dory lift toward a pale moon. Homer sea, hard and simple.
About this work
Kissing the Moon is a 1904 oil by Winslow Homer, painted in the last years of his life and now in the Addison Gallery of American Art at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. Three men sit in a large ocean-going dory far offshore. The boat has slipped into a trough between waves, so the horizon is hidden, and only the crest of the wave on the right reaches up to touch the distant full moon. That touch gives the picture its title. The art historian John Wilmerding notes that the man in the stern is dressed for bird hunting and the other two are fishermen, yet there is no gun or net in sight, only a glimpse of an oar. They seem to be drifting, each looking at a different patch of water. The man facing us has been identified, first by the scholar Philip Beam, as Homer's nephew Arthur Patch Homer, a reading the family supports; one recent biography proposes a different sitter. Wilmerding suggests that the man in the black sou'wester, seen from behind, may be the painter himself. The diagonal lines of cloud and wave recall Homer's earlier sea pictures such as The Fog Warning and The Gulf Stream, but here the boat goes nowhere.
Sources: John Wilmerding, "'Kissing the Moon': Winslow Homer's Mortal Men at Sea", The Wall Street Journal (2024), via Addison Gallery · Wikimedia Commons: Winslow Homer - Kissing the Moon
Print facts
- Native resolution
- 9,568 × 7,104 px
- Sharp at 150 ppi up to
- 63 × 47 in
- Sizes
- Small (20 × 15 in) · $100 · 474 ppi
Medium (24 × 18 in) · $150 · 395 ppi
Large (36 × 27 in) · $300 · 263 ppi - Price includes
- Frame and US shipping · 14–21 days · 30-day returns
FAQ
Where can I buy a framed print of Kissing the Moon?
Here. Kissing the Moon is available as a framed print in three sizes: Small (20 × 15 in) for $100, Medium (24 × 18 in) for $150 and Large (36 × 27 in) for $300. Prices include the frame and US shipping; delivery takes 14–21 days, with 30-day returns.
What size works best for Kissing the Moon?
The file is 9,568 × 7,104 px, so every size is sharp: even Large (36 × 27 in) prints at 263 ppi. Choose Large (36 × 27 in) for a large wall; Small (20 × 15 in) suits a narrower space.
Is it legal to print Kissing the Moon?
Yes. Kissing the Moon is in the public domain: its copyright, if it ever had one, expired long ago. In the United States a faithful photograph of a public-domain painting does not create a new copyright (Bridgeman v. Corel, 1999), so the image can be printed and sold freely.
