Bears in the Watermelon Patch 1871

William Holbrook Beard painted these bears with oil on canvas sometime in the late 19th century. Humorous animal paintings were popular at the time, but they also tell us something about attitudes to nature and the shifting place of wildlife in American society. Beard painted in the era of westward expansion and this image of happy bears feasting in a stolen watermelon patch touches on themes of civilization versus wilderness. It uses a visual code of idyllic, rural Americana with the corn stalks suggesting a bountiful land. But these are wild creatures intruding on cultivated land. Are they a threat, or just funny? We can better understand this painting by researching popular imagery of the time and the status of formerly abundant species in the landscape. In a time of changing human and animal relations, Beard’s painting asks us to reconsider the social norms of our relationship to the environment.