The Golden State Entering New York Harbor

The Golden State Entering New York Harbor is an 1854 painting (oil on canvass, 26" x 48' or 66 cm x 121.9 cm) of an American three-masted clipper merchant ship by Fitz Henry Lane (1804-1865). Lane was an American lithographer and a maritime painter who lived most his life in the New England fishing city of Gloucester, Massachusetts, north of Boston, Massachusetts, on Cape Ann. The painting is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Background Although Lane spent much of his life in Massachusetts, he had a strong incentive during the early 1850s to spend time in New York City, a busy seaport full of activity for a maritime artist. First, Lane's work was being sold through exhibitions at New York galleries. Second, Lane was hired by Chambers & Heiser, a New York merchant shipping line, to paint the company's new vessel, the Golden State. The ship, built for travel to California – during the California Gold Rush – around Cape Horn during a period when transcontinental land crossings across North America were not reliable, was launched in 1853, the same year that Westervelt was elected Mayor of New York City. For Lane, the work in 1854 on The Golden State Entering New York Harbor was a repeat commission. Chambers & Heiser had brought him to New York during the previous year to paint the company's clipper ship Sweepstakes. Description The Golden State Entering New York Harbor was commissioned by the owner of Golden State, Lane’s second for Chambers & Heiser. It is rich in detail, depicting New York City in the background, as seen from New Jersey. A steamship is shown just past the bow of the Golden State. A variety of vessels plies New York Harbor.