Artwork
Lobster Fishermen
Lobster Fishermen is an unspecified painting by the American Folk Art artist Marsden Hartley. It dates from 1940 and is held in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
About this work
Workers haul lobster on the Maine coast where Marsden Hartley grew up. The painting belongs to his Maine Series, a body of work centered on the state's shore and people. He made it in 1940, near the end of his life, when he often turned to scenes of daily labor.
Subject & Meaning
Marsden Hartley’s Lobster Fishermen (1940) centers on the labor and environment of Maine’s lobster-fishing industry, rendering the figures in a simplified, folk-art style that Hartley adopted during his return to the state. The composition groups fishermen on a dock, their forms reduced to geometric shapes and muted earth tones, evoking a sense of communal resilience against the rugged coastal backdrop. The work aligns with Hartley’s broader 'Maine Series,' where isolation and tradition take visual precedence, reflecting his nostalgic engagement with his native landscape after years spent away.
The painting’s iconography, anchors, ropes, and weathered structures, anchors it in the daily realities of maritime life, while its stylistic primitivism underscores Hartley’s engagement with folk-art currents of the 1930s.
Technique & Style
Hartley rendered the scene of fishermen on a dock with a composition that critics have noted parallels Paul Cézanne's The Card Players.
Lobster Fishermen is an oil painting executed on a masonite support, created by Marsden Hartley between 1940 and 1941. The work measures 75.6 cm in height and 103.8 cm in width. Stylistically, the piece reflects a self-consciously "primitive" approach associated with the Folk Art movement, characterized by a deliberate simplification of form.
Hartley rendered the scene of fishermen on a dock with a composition that critics have noted parallels Paul Cézanne's The Card Players. The handling emphasizes the rugged, isolated atmosphere of Maine's coastal life, utilizing the durability of the masonite panel to support the artist's simplified, block-like depiction of the figures and their environment during his residence in Corea, Maine.
History & Provenance
Lobster Fishermen was created by Marsden Hartley in 1940‑41 while he was living in an abandoned church in the fishing village of Corea, Maine, as part of his Maine Series. The painting, executed in oil on masonite, is documented as having been produced in 1940 with a related study also completed in 1940, both of which are now in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The sources do not record any prior owners, a specific commission, or a detailed ownership chain before the work entered the Met’s holdings.
Lobster Fishermen, painted by Marsden Hartley in 1940, is held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The painting, executed in oil on masonite, measures 75.6 by 103.8 centimeters and forms part of the museum's collection of Hartley's Maine Series works. A preparatory study for the painting, produced in 1940, is also held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The sources do not specify a formal accession number or a documented exhibition history for the work.
Context
Lobster Fishermen occupies a defined place within Marsden Hartley's Maine Series, a body of work produced after his 1937 return to his native state following years in urban art centers. The painting emerged during a period when Hartley had reestablished himself as one of Maine's foremost painters, drawn to the isolation of coastal life. Its creation coincided with the rise of the American Folk Art movement, and Hartley adopted a self-consciously "primitive" style visible across his Maine canvases, including this one.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has drawn a specific art-historical parallel between Lobster Fishermen and Paul Cézanne's series The Card Players, situating Hartley's depiction of posed lobster fishermen on a Corea dock within a lineage of figure-group compositions. A 1940 study for the painting also entered the Met's collection, underscoring the work's significance within Hartley's late-career output.
Overview
Lobster Fishermen is an oil painting by American artist Marsden Hartley, completed in 1940. Executed on masonite, this work depicts a scene of daily labor among fishermen in Maine, the artist's home state. It belongs to a significant body of work known as his 'Maine Series' and is currently housed in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
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Artist
Marsden Hartley was an American Modernist painter, poet, and essayist. Hartley developed his painting abilities by observing Cubist artists in Paris and Berlin.
