Mauritz F.H. de Haas
Deep coloration presides in this painting, backlit with the luminous finale of a warm day off the New York Coast. This painting is from a view northeast of Long Island, looking southwest at the elevations of Montauk Point and Long Island Proper. De Haas, well familiar with the sailing environs of greater New York, and well beyond the waters of the sound.
The burnished sky glows with a range of warm yellows, with the cloud caps blazing strongest as the sun, well, sets. The largest ship, a steam-sail merchantman running perpendicular to the wind, cuts through the scene with several schooners sailing on the horizon for parts elsewhere. A two-masted lugger was an uncommon but not unknown of sight in New York waters, as several were used as life saving vessels as well as fishers, in part due to their very quick directional handling. Even at this distance, they are working their sailing to keep clear of the large ship.
Deep ocean currents cut through the North Atlantic, and de Haas shows he has given them notice, for his water portrays some of the chaotic action of the swells near the coastlines. In an interesting manner, he chose to impart the difficulties of vision a setting sun at sea creates, with the darkening of the lower elevations, and the brightest illumination existing on the undersides of the clouds, rising even beyond the reach of the tall ship's masts. The last moments of precious daylight will be met with oil lamps and extended watches as the sailors head away and toward New York.
