Approaching Storm

A lone figure hurries across a rocky field, hunched against the wind, while a great mass of dark clouds rolls in overhead. The trees bend and shudder, their leaves catching the last bit of light before the weather turns. Edward Mitchell Bannister painted this moment right at the edge of a storm, when the air feels heavy and everyone is racing to find shelter. The man clutching something to his chest gives the whole scene a sense of urgency that pulls your eye straight to him.

Bannister was a Black American painter working in the late 1800s, and his story is worth knowing. Born in Canada, he settled in Providence, Rhode Island, and won a major award at the 1876 Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia. When the judges realized the winning artist was Black, some tried to take the prize back, but the other artists stood up for him and he kept it. He loved the countryside of New England and painted it again and again, often drawing on the loose, moody style of the French Barbizon painters who worked outdoors and cared more about feeling than fine detail.

The rocks in the foreground are painted with quick, thick strokes, and if you follow the muddy path winding off to the right, you get a sense of just how far that traveler still has to go before the rain catches up with him.