On the Beach at Long Branch

Driving in an open coach was a popular leisure activity at seaside resorts. Such drives were a daily form of social ritual, offering both the carriage and its occupants as objects for display. Homer’s radically cropped composition reduces the coach (and the liveried male driver) to a framework for a trio of well-dressed beauties. The artist’s emphasis on details of their dress, coiffeur, and accessories approaches the conventional fashion plate in this illustration, which has no accompanying text. Nevertheless, Homer captures our imagination and suggests a narrative with the elaborate costumes and lively conversation among the young women, oblivious to the ocean view beyond and the surf beneath the wheels.