After his experience as an illustrator during the Civil War, Homer turned his attention to lighter scenes from contemporary life, often focusing on fashionable young women. This painting of three bathers on a beach in Massachusetts was his most daring subject to this day. Critics were less disturbed by the disquieting mood than by the fact that, as was noted, the figures " were extraordinarily red-blooded and clumsy. As in much of Homer's art, there is an air of mystery and melancholy in the scene, suggesting deeper meanings beneath the surface.
Winslow Homer was an American lithographer, draughtsman and painter. He is considered by many to be the most important American painter of the 19th century. Homer is a representative of realistic genre painting. He was an excellent animal painter and made many watercolors.
