Winslow Homer (American, 1836–1910). A Basket of Clams, 1873. Copyright © The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY. Photo Credit: Art Resource, NY

Homer spent the summer of 1873 in Gloucester, Massachusetts, where he painted a number of works that observed children in their daily activities. Here, 2 boys carry a heavy bucket of clams; the smaller boy looks awkwardly—and perhaps warily—at the contents, rotating his neck with lateral flexion to the right. The older boy appears to be looking at the beached ship, or perhaps looking away from a dead fish in the foreground. Art historians note that, in the period immediately following the Civil War, many American artists seemed to focus on children as symbols of both a simpler past and a brighter future.