Head of the Charles Race Day

Cambridge, MA

With a prominent location opposite the famous rowing club, and amid the jostling and cheering crowds near this finish line, I attempted to capture the pageantry of this world-wide amateur event – with rowers, crowds, boats, flags and the verdant landscape of Memorial Drive.

The distinctive architecture of the venerable club with its dormers, shaded balconies and porches was festooned with all manner of colorful flags from countries around the world. The energy of the rowers and the cheering of the supportive crowd, and the continual swooshing of the sleek boats and rhythmic sound of the oars is implied with the sweeping strokes of color.

Given all the surrounding activity, as well as the chill of an October afternoon, the watercolor was applied with quick, efficient brushwork to suggest the constant movement throughout the scene. The energetic composition is grounded by the river and the sky, and framed by the large trees located on either side of the Charles. Some months later, from a suggestion by a rower’s keen eye, the work needed a slight adjustment to the scull and crew, to correct the number of alternating oars in the water.