Exploring the Text

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  1. What strikes you first and most powerfully about the painting? Is it a specific detail or a general feeling?

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - What strikes you first and most powerfully about the painting? Is it a specific detail or a general feeling?
  2. What does the composition of the painting suggest about its meaning? Consider the division of space, the colors, and the placement of the figure.

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - What does the composition of the painting suggest about its meaning? Consider the division of space, the colors, and the placement of the figure.
  3. What is the effect of the central figure having his back to us, the viewers? Do you think Winslow Homer is making a statement about “turning his back” on something or someone, or does this perspective lead the viewer to a particular attitude toward the scene? Explain.

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - What is the effect of the central figure having his back to us, the viewers? Do you think Winslow Homer is making a statement about “turning his back” on something or someone, or does this perspective lead the viewer to a particular attitude toward the scene? Explain.
  4. What biblical associations does wheat have? How might specific scriptures inform your understanding of the painting?

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - What biblical associations does wheat have? How might specific scriptures inform your understanding of the painting?
  5. The veteran in this painting holds a scythe that was out-of-date even during this period. If you look carefully, you can see the multiple blades of a more modern cradle scythe that Homer deliberately painted over in favor of the archaic single-bladed scythe. Why might the artist have done that? What is the impact of the veteran using an old-fashioned single-bladed scythe to mow the field?

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - The veteran in this painting holds a scythe that was out-of-date even during this period. If you look carefully, you can see the multiple blades of a more modern cradle scythe that Homer deliberately painted over in favor of the archaic single-bladed scythe. Why might the artist have done that? What is the impact of the veteran using an old-fashioned single-bladed scythe to mow the field?
  6. What is the narrative of this painting—that is, what story does it tell? Is it optimistic? Sad? Redemptive? Ambivalent? Is it a story of new beginnings, or is it an elegy? Explain your response by citing details from the painting and your understanding of its historical context.

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - What is the narrative of this painting—that is, what story does it tell? Is it optimistic? Sad? Redemptive? Ambivalent? Is it a story of new beginnings, or is it an elegy? Explain your response by citing details from the painting and your understanding of its historical context.
  7. Many of the Civil War’s bloodiest battles were fought in fields of grain, and in Chapter 7 (p. 686) you analyzed an image of one of them in A Harvest of Death. That photo, like many others, pictures corpses lying on a field. Given this information, along with the details of Homer’s painting, how do you interpret the title Homer chose?

    Question

    ALMF/kS1zzW73MouRsoXk1h0lKY=
    Exploring the Text: - Many of the Civil War’s bloodiest battles were fought in fields of grain, and in Chapter 7 (p. 686) you analyzed an image of one of them in A Harvest of Death. That photo, like many others, pictures corpses lying on a field. Given this information, along with the details of Homer’s painting, how do you interpret the title Homer chose?