Prisoners from the Front by Winslow Homer in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, February 2020

Prisoners from the Front
1866

Winslow Homer American


Object Details

Title: Prisoners from the Front

Artist: Winslow Homer (American, Boston, Massachusetts 1836–1910 Prouts Neck, Maine)

Date: 1866

Culture: American

Medium: Oil on canvas

Dimensions: 24 x 38in. (61 x 96.5cm)
Framed: 36 1/2 × 50 5/8 × 4 1/2 in. (92.7 × 128.6 × 11.4 cm)

Credit Line: Gift of Mrs. Frank B. Porter, 1922

Accession Number: 22.207


The material that Homer collected as an artist-correspondent during the Civil War provided the subjects for his first oil paintings. In 1866, one year after the war ended and four years after he reputedly began to paint in oil, Homer completed this picture, a work that established his reputation. It represents an actual scene from the war in which a Union officer, Brigadier General Francis Channing Barlow (1834–1896) captured several Confederate officers on June 21, 1864. The background depicts the battlefield at Petersburg, Virginia. Infrared photography and numerous studies indicate that the painting underwent many changes in the course of completion.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/11133