Eel Spearing at Setauket
1845 · Oil on canvas · Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown
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About this work
- Artist
- William Sidney Mount (1807–1868)
- Year
- 1845
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Original size
- 72.4 × 91.4 cm
- Collection
- Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown
- Movement
- Realism
A Black woman stands in the bow of a flat-bottomed boat on still water, poised with a long eel spear, while a boy sits in the stern steering with a paddle, against the low hills and white houses of Setauket on Long Island. Mount, who spent his life in the neighbouring village of Stony Brook, painted it for a patron who remembered eel spearing there as a child. The glassy water doubles the figures and the boat in reflection. Often counted among the finest American genre paintings, it is in the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York.
This exhibition-poster edition shows the whole work beneath original typography set in-house. The original is in the public domain.
Where it works
A calm sandy-gold waterside scene for a living room, study or lake house in a dark wood frame. It suits cream, sage or warm grey walls at 12×18 and pairs with Bingham's Fur Traders Descending the Missouri.
Style, size & framing detail
- Style
- Exhibition poster of a Realism painting
- Era
- 19th century (1845)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Palette
- cream & beige
- Mood
- classic
- Rooms
- living room, study or library, dining room, dorm room, hallway or entryway
- Good gift for
- housewarming, art lovers
Size. We'd hang this one at 12×18. Prints at 12×18, 16×24, 24×36 in — 12×18 for a shelf, desk or a gallery-wall grid; 16×24 above a desk, console or in a hallway; 24×36 as the statement piece above a sofa or bed.
Framing. Exhibition posters sit best in a slim black frame with no mat — the typeset margin is the mat.
Pairing. Pairs as a set of three with other famous painting prints (10% off three or more).
Details & materials
Shipping & returns
Is this the whole painting, or a crop?
Is Eel Spearing at Setauket in the public domain?
What is it printed on?
When was Eel Spearing at Setauket painted, and in what medium?
What size works above a sofa or bed?
About this design
The Madten promise
A fine-art print
The same artwork as a clean fine-art print — the image shown large with a minimal caption.





















