Entrance to Harbor—Moonlight

A full-rigged sailing ship under furled and spread canvas heads toward a distant harbor entrance beneath a pale moon. A lighthouse and faint shapes of headlands rise on the right, while surf glimmers on the wet sand in the foreground. The gray gouache ground and scratched highlights create a quiet nocturnal sea.

Look closer: A small sailboat with a tiny sail sits near the left edge of the water, close to the shore.

Artist

David Johnson Kennedy

Date

1881

Medium

Watercolor, gouache, graphite, pastel, and sgraffito on white wove paper coated with gray gouache

Source

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Size

2335 × 1430 px

Credit (appreciated, not required for public-domain works): The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 1968