Thomas Eakins

The Gross Clinic — unflinching American realism

The greatest American realist of the nineteenth century and one of the most uncompromising portraitists in the history of art. Trained in Paris under Gerome and steeped in the anatomy of Velazquez and Rembrandt, Eakins brought a scientific, almost surgical truthfulness to American painting. His insistence on the nude in teaching cost him his post at the Pennsylvania Academy, but his portraits — grave, inward, psychologically merciless — and his great surgical and rowing scenes remain the foundation of serious American figurative art.

Key works

• The Gross Clinic1875— A surgeon mid-operation — the most powerful American painting of the century
  Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia
• The Champion Single Sculls (Max Schmitt in a Single Scull)1871— Light, water, and stillness on the Schuylkill
  Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
• The Agnew Clinic1889— His second great surgical theater, larger and brighter
  University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

Connections

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