Two Small Boats Moored to Beach c. 1875

John Singer Sargent made this drawing of boats with graphite on paper. Sargent’s confident hatching and cross-hatching captures the scene, and the texture of both water and land. With a mastery of tone, the artist uses darker strokes to suggest depth. Notice the way the graphite is applied in varying pressures to bring the boats and the surrounding beach and rocks to life. The drawing is clearly done in the “field,” en plein air. It has an immediacy, the marks laid down without hesitation. It is important to consider what kind of work this is. Sargent was not a boat builder, so it is not that. Yet, in its own way, the drawing is an act of close observation, of making, which is also a form of labor. This drawing invites us to think more deeply about the value we place on different kinds of making.