EDWIN LORD WEEKS
American, 1849–1903

View from the Deck of the Steamer "Occidental" en Route to India

Signed E. L. Weeks
Oil on board, en grisaille
10 x 17¾ inches (25.4 x 45 cm)
Framed: 16¼ x 24 inches (41.3 x 61 cm)

This work was painted on December 2, 1892, during the artist's third and last passage to India. Weeks had recently boarded the steamer Occidental in Bushire (Bushehr) for the final stage of his voyage. The vessel stopped at Bunder Abbas (the location of the present work, at the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz), Jask, and Muscat before arriving, as the artist describes it, "almost with regret", in Karachi [Weeks, 1895, p. 145].

The painting is illustrated in Weeks's From the Black Sea through Persia and India in which the artist describes the subject: "All day long we are surrounded by a crowd of boats and barges. A quaint high-pooped pinnace, a survival of ancient days, is drifting aimlessly about, unable to discharge its cargo of eight horses... Many new passengers have come on board... Most of the new-comers are Hindoos and Indians of varied castes" [Weeks, 1895, pp. 134-35].

Provenance
Estate of Edwin Lord Weeks (sale, American Art Galleries, New York, March 15, 1905, lot 24, as Ferry – Persian Gulf)
Frederick Keppel & Co., New York
Private Collection, New Jersey
Private Collection, Connecticut, 2007-2026 (acquired from the above)

Literature
Edwin Lord Weeks, From the Black Sea through Persia and India, London and New York, 1895, p. 134, illustrated

$75,000

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