Beach of Bass Rocks, Gloucester, Massachusetts

Frank Knox Morton Rehn was known primarily as a marine painter whose images captured scenes along the Massachusetts coast. This painting depicts a stretch of beach in Gloucester, a popular East Coast tourist destination throughout the nineteenth century. The scene is dominated by sky and sea, yet Rehn avoided using shades of blue and instead chose warmer tones of brown and red. This limited use of color emphasizes the dark shadows under the approaching waves, making them appear much bigger than they really are. This, combined with the deserted beach, evokes the latent power of the sea in a view that initially appears calm.