Children of the Sea (painting)

Children of the Sea or Kinderen Der Zee is an 1872 oil-on-canvas painting by Dutch artist Jozef Israëls. The painting is a depiction of peasant children playing in the ocean.

Children of the Sea
Dutch: Kinderen Der Zee
Children of the Sea
ArtistJozef Israëls
Year1872 (1872)
MediumOil-on-canvas
MovementRealism (arts)
SubjectChildren at play
Dimensions48.5 cm (19.1 in) x 93.5 cm (36.8 in)
LocationRijksmuseum, Amsterdam
WebsiteJewish Wedding

History

Israëls first painted the subject of Children of the Sea in 1863. The subject was popular and Israëls repeated it in other paintings.[1] Many of his paintings show peasants at work or resting. Children of the Sea portrays children at play, and the toy is a sailing boat in the shallow water.[2] In Dutch the painting is known as Kinderen Der Zee.[3] The painting is now in the collections of the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.[1]

Israëls created at least 13 different versions or configurations of children playing by the sea. While documenting the lives and struggles of fishermen he took time to document the joy and innocence of children at play.[4]

Description

Children of a fisherman play in the ocean wearing their working class clothing, and a toy boat floats in front of them. If you look closely, there appears to be a drowning rat clinging to the boat. There are four children; the largest is a boy who carries a younger child on his back.[1]

Reception

The painting appears on the cover of the 2021 book Aus Meinen Kindertagen by Selma Lagerlöf.[5] Another version appears on the cover of Edith Nesbit's 2022 fantasy fiction novel Wet Magic.[6]

References
  1. "Children of the Sea, Jozef Israëls, 1872". Rijksmuseum. Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. Archived from the original on 14 January 2023. Retrieved 14 January 2023.
  2. Phythian, John Ernest (1912). Jozef Israëls. England: G. Allen, Limited. p. 62. Archived from the original on 3 March 2023. Retrieved 12 January 2023.
  3. Asvarishch, Boris; Vliegenthart-van der Valk Bouman, J. M. (1994). Dutch 19th century painting from the Hermitage and Paleis Het Loo. Ann Arbor, Michigan: The University of Michigan. p. 113. ISBN 9789040097058. Archived from the original on 3 March 2023. Retrieved 14 January 2023.
  4. Schmidt, Gilya Gerda (2003). The art and artists of the fifth Zionist Congress, 1901 : heralds of a new age (1st ed.). Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press. p. 59. ISBN 9780815630302. Archived from the original on 3 March 2023. Retrieved 14 January 2023.
  5. Lagerlöf, Selma (2021). Selma Lagerlöf: Aus meinen Kindertagen. Göttingen, Germany: LIWI Literatur- und Wissenschaftsverlag. ISBN 9783965424203.
  6. Nesbit, Edith (2022). Wet Magic. Pennsylvania: Benn.
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